,,

HISTORY
"

':.-.- _ 1
PERSPECTIVES
/
History of Concepts
History ofConcepts
Comparative Perspectives
EDITED [\1'
lAIN HAMl'SIIER-MONK
KAIUN Tll.)"lANS
eRA"';': VAN Vfl.EE
AMSTERDAM U;,JIVERS1TY PRESS
The publisher and editors gratefully acknowledge the assistance of the Huizinga insriruur,
the Dr. Hendrik Muller's Vadcrlandsch Ponds and the M.A.O.C. Cravin van Bylandr-
sricluing.
Cover illustration (Front): Edwacrt Collier, VanilllS stil!liP. Sredclijk Museum 'de Lakenhal'. Leiden.
Cover illustration (back): Rembrandt van Ri]n. Sdrportmit with a dead bittcrn (1639).
Gemaldegalerie, Dresden.
Cover design: [aak Crasborn Bno. Valkenbul'g aid Ccul
LlY"OUt: Fontline. Nijrnegen
lSBN: 90 5356 306 7
Amsterdam Univcrsirv Press, Amsterdam, 1998
All rights reserved. ~ i t o l l t limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no pan ofrhis book
may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or rransmirtcd, in any form or by
any means (electronic, mechanical, phorocopying, recording, or otherwise]. without the written
permission of both the copyrighr owner and the author of rhis book.
Contents
Acknowledgements
lain Hampsher-Monk, Karin Iilmans and Fmnle van Vree
A Comparative Perspective on Conceptual History - An Introduction
IX
PART I
CHAPTER 1
THFORETfCAL AND COMPARATIVE FRAMEWORKS II
Pimdell Boer
The Historiography of German Begriffigeschichte and the Dutch Project of
Conceptual History
CHAI'TFR 2
Reinbart Kose!leck
Social History and Begriffigeschn-hte
CHAPTER .'3
lain Hampsher-Monle
Speech Acts, Languages or Conceptual History?
CHAPTER 4
Ham Ericb Bodekcr
Concept - Meaning - Discourse. Begriffigeschichte Reconsidered
13
23
37
5I
CONTENTS V
PART 11
CHAPTER 5
THEMES AND VARIATIONS 65
Maurizio Viroli
The Origin and the Meaning of rhe Reason of Stale
CHAPTER 6
Terence Ball
Conceptual History and the History of Political Tboughr
CHAl"lER 7
67
75
Bernhard F Scholz
Conceptual History in Context: Reconstructing the Terminology of an Academic
Discipline 87
CHAPTER 8
Willem Frtjhoff
Conceptual History, Social History and Cultural History: the Test of
'Cosmopolirisrn'
CHAPTER 9
103
Hans-]iirgen Lusebrink
Conceptual History and Conceptual Transfer: the Case ufNarion' In Revolutionary
France and Germany 115
PART III
CHAI'TFR ]0
CONCEPT AND IMAGF 129
Bram Kempers
Words, Images and All the Pope's Men, Raphael's Stanza della Segnatura and the
Synthesis of Divine Wisdom 131
VI HISTORY OJ-
CHAPTER 1 1
Eddy de]ongh
Painted Words in Dutch Art of the Seventeenth Century
CHAPTER 12
167
Rolf Keichardt
Historical Semantics and Political Iconography: The Case of the Game of the
French Revolution (1791/92) 191
EPILOGUE
Martin van Gelderen
Between Cambridge and Heidelberg. Concepts, Languages and Images in
Intellectual History 227
On the Contributors 239
Notes 243
Index of Names 281
Index of Subjects 291
COI'TENTS VII
Acknowledgements
This book would neve-r have been writte-n hut for the existence of the 'vcthcrland.,
Institute of Advanced Studies in \v'asscl1aar, for it \\;lS in i',']AS in 199/i-199"i that
an international research group on conceptual history was formed which took
the initiative for the present study. \\'h<l1 started out then as J discussion group
on the nu-thcxlological problems of comparative conccptuulhisrory later continued
as the editorial hoard which has guided this present volume, and infinite thanks
an- owed to Ibns ]';iidt'kcr. Pim den BOl'L Martin van Gelderell and 'X!ygCf
Vclcm.r for their Invaluable and stimulating contributions and editorial SUpP(lI"l_
The editorial meetings were made financially possihle through a generous grant
from rhc Hui'.inga Institute. which also subsidized the translation into English of
the chapter hy l'im den Hoer. \'{'.... would like \0 thank the board of the Huizinga
Institute most sincerely fur their help. \\,'c also gratefully acknowledge the Sllp-
POI1 of the \)1' Hcndrik Muller's Vaderlandsch Ponds and the \LA.o,C. Gravin
van Bvlandtstirhring. uoth of which g('nen)usly helped to subsidize rhe publication
of this volume. Spec-ial thanks arc- due here- to Nie-kvan Sas. who made sure that
the productton work could finally he started. Also, wc would like to thank
Amsterdam University Press for having confidence in this intcmationalcntcrpn:,c
and for their continuous and elllhusiaslic encouragement during the final stages
of the project. \X'ithollt their efforts this hook would never have seen the light of
day, and would certainly not have turned out so handsomely
lain Hampsher-Monk
Karin Tilmans
Frank van vrec
lX
Amsterdam/Exeter Spring 199H
l:-.JTRODL:CTION
A Comparative Perspective on
Conceptual History- An Introduction
lAIN HAMPSHER-MONK, KARIN TILMANS AND FRANK VAN VIl.EE
In recent decades the growing recognition of the importance of language in understanding
reality has dramatically changed both the focus and methods of the humanities and social
sciences. A major feature of this has been the development of histories of concepts, of po-
litical languages and discourse. However, the orientation and methodological approach
within this movement varies considerably from one country to another, depending on dif-
ferent linguistic and scholarly traditions in the humanities. This volume displays the diver-
sity of areas in which conceptual history is currently being deployed, as well as the range of
traditions which seek, in their different ways, to deploy one or another form of it.
In Germany a longstanding interest in the history of concepts, reaching back as far as
Hegel, resulted in a particularly ambitious and monumental project, led by Reinhan
Koselleck, Ono Brunner and Werner Come. Its aim was to investigate fundamental con-
cepts in history, Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe, . with regard to their functioning as 'both a
factor in, and an indicator of historical processes'. The project resulted in two massive se-
ries: Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe. Hisioriecbes Lexicon zur poliiiscb-soualen Sprache in
Deutschland, seven volumes of which were published between 1972 and 1992, dealing with
socio-poliricalianguage in Germany, and the Handbuch politiscb-sozialer Grundbegriffe in
Franlereich, fifteen volumes of which have been published since 1985, edited by Rolf
Reichardr and Eberhard Schmitt.
Both works focus on concepts that are considered to be crucial to the 'sprachliche
Erfassung der moderne Welt' - the linguistic constitution of modern world - in law, poli-
tics, science, social and economic life and ideology, concepts on which various segments of
society and parties relied to express their experiences, expectations, and actions.' A good
example is the concepr ofHerrschefe' (dominion, domination, lordship, rule, command),
the entry of which in the Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe is extensively discussed by Melvin
Richter in his recent book TheHistory ofPolitical and Social Concepts." These concepts were
studied over a time-scale which in many cases went back to Antiquity. However, the key
period for analysis was that period that following the Enlightenment, a period identified as
. NOTE Unle" it is dear from rhc context, the term Begriffige"chichrewhich has a wider meaning in Ger-
man will be used in this volume explicitly to denote the work and approaches associated with rhe
Geschichslicbr Grundbegriffi project and its successors.
IN-j-ROllUn-ION
constituting a watershed or Sattdzcir-: Sane!' literally a saddle, here evoking the image of a
pass across a mountain range linking two valleys. The transition denoted by the term
Sattelzeit is the historical transition to modernity. For Koselleck - who may be considered
to be the auctor intellectualis of the German project - modernity was characterised by four
processes which affected societies and their self-awareness: Verzeitlichung (the location
within a temporal and historical development), Demokratisierung (democratization),
Ideologiesierbarkeit (the increasing susceptibility of concepts to abstraction from their COIl-
crere social and historical referent) and Politisierung [politicization}.
At the heart of the method of the Begnffigeschichte were several technical analytical con-
cepts, drawn mostly from linguistics. The founder of this discipline, the Swiss scholar
Ferdinand de Saussure (1857-1913) had already drawn attention to the distinction be-
tween the diachronic and synchronic aspects of a language -language changes across time
and yet has a definite structure at anyone point in time. Begnffigeschichte focuses upon
both, alternating analysis of key concepts within a given semantic field at anyone point in
hisrory, with a diachronic perspective which draws out shifts or changes in the meaning of
concepts.
The founders of the Begriffigeschichte project sought to overcome the limitations of his-
torical philology and lexicography. This required their not identifying the concept with any
single word. Three analytical linguistic devices were vital in enabling them to do this. The
idea of a semantic field held out the prospect of defining a concept not in lexical terms, but
in terms of ranges of characteristic synonyms, antonyms, associated terms, forming a more
or less unified part of a vocabulary at a given time. So the concept ofHerrschafi' should be
studied within the same semantic field as 'Machr' (power), 'Cewalr' (force, violence),
'Aurorirac' (authority), 'Sraat' (state) or other related concepts. At the same time, the dis-
tinction between concept and word or rerm was marked by the distinction between
onomasiology - the study of the different terms available for designating the same or simi-
lar thing or concept - and semasiology which seeks to discover all the different meanings of
a given term. An onomasiological analysis of the concept of 'liberty' would therefore seek
out all the terms and expressions that could be used to designate it. By contrast, a semi-
ological analysis of the word 'liberty' seeks to identify the variety of meanings it may bear.
The Begriffigeschichte project was a massive scholarly enterprise with a very distinctive
methodology. However, it was not only in Germany, but also in France and the English-
speaking world that scholars were turning away from earlier approaches to intellectual his-
tory and the history of political ideas. J.G.A. Pocock and Quentin Skinner, for example, re-
defined the object of the history of political thought in terms of a diachronic and
synchronic study oflanguage. In their view, the task of the historian was to identify and re-
construct the languages in which political moves were made. Other scholars took a similar
position, moving away from the 'masterpieces' of political thought to a history of concep-
tual change, political language and discourse.
Paradoxally, these shifts in bisroriography, closely interwoven with linguistic and specific
scholarly traditions, have taken place contemporaneously but relatively independently.
This volume not only aims to present an account of recent developments in the history of
2 HISTO){I' OF CONCF!'TS
concepts, but also reflects critically on the results and, in particular, compares the methods
and basic assumptions of different approaches within these fields of research.
Resulting from an initiative by Dutch historians, this volume, and even more the project
which it represents and spearheads, can even be said to find its rdlson detre in a confronta-
tion of research traditions. Although impressed by the voluminous Gachichtliche
Grundbegriffi, Dutch scholars, considering the possibility of a project on the history of
concepts in the Netherlands, felt that they had to develop an approach that would be tai-
lored to the historical peculiarities of the Low Countries.' As the editors of the Handbuch
palitisch-sozialer Grundbegriffi in Frankreich had already experienced, some of the main fea-
tures of German Begriffigeschichte seemed to bear less relevance to the history of concepts in
other languages, e.g. the one-sided emphasis on the eighteenth century as the Sateteeit. the
epoch of 'conceptual modernisation'. On the other hand, it was clear, too, that the Ge-
schichtliche Grundbegriffe fails to address images, or, to be more specific, the problem of the
relationship between verbal and visual representation. It can be argued that a history of
socio-political thought cannot be written properly without an in-depth analysis of visual
language.
Since some of the Dutch scholars were also familiar with developments in the English-
speaking world, the idea of a confrontation of different traditions easily arose. Such an ex-
ploration of methods and approaches was thought to be helpful in establishing a solid and
practical basis for Dutch conceptual history. From 1990 on, there were a number of lec-
tures and conferences, initially in Amsterdam and later at the Netherlands Institute ofAd-
oanced Study(NlAS) in Wassenaar. These meetings were attended not only by Dutch schol-
ars, but also by protagonists of different approaches from Germany, France, Great Britain,
Italy and the United States. This volume contains selected papers and lectures from those
delivered at the NlAS conferences, as well as some contributions especially written for this
publication.
As an endeavour to correlate, explain and reconsider different approaches to the history
of social and political thought, with a view to assimilating the results of this exploration
into a national research program, this volume constitutes an example of a very distinctive
characteristic of the history of the Netherlands. From late medieval times, the Low Coun-
tries have functioned as an international market place, not only for the trading of money
and commodities but [or the exchange of ideas and cultural goods as well. Initially this
market profited from the dominant commercial and political position of the Dutch Re-
public, the absence of an autocratic and ccntralist regime and the prevailing economic and
religious freedom. Later, the country took advantage of its central geographical position,
surrounded by the rising powers of Western Europe. The initial results of the Dutch con-
cepts project show that with regard to the development of concepts and discourse too, the
Dutch have played an important role in the history of European thought.
Even today, policy makers, scholars, artists and theorists of national identity consider
this role as a broker to be at the heart of Dutch national politics and culture. Therefore, the
need for cross-national comparison and confrontation of methods and disciplines, felt
from the outset by the initiators of the Dutch project, was in a sense 'natural'.
IN'lROllUCT10N 3
The volume consists of thirteen contributions, divided into three sections, the first of
which introduces and discusses the methodological issues involved in Begrijjsgeschichte and
the related intellectual pursuits in Anglophone and Francophone academic life.
In the opening chapter, Pim den Boer describes in detail the institutional origins, aspira-
tions and conduct of the Gacbicbtliche Grundbegrif]e project, its place in the German
hisroriographical tradition, and the contributions of the individual editors, as well as its
successor the HandlJUch politiscb-soeialer Grundbegriffe in Franlereich 1680-1820. He then
introduces the case of Holland and what might be expected from a Dutch enterprise of a
similar kind: what it might tell us about the extraordinary case of early modern Dutch soci-
ety where a very different Sattelzeitcould be expected, what comparative light it might re-
Fleet on other such studies and the societies studied, and what light Dutch, as a linguisti-
cally 'open' site, can shed on the peculiar problem of conceptual transfer and appropriation
between different natural languages that is addressed in this book by Frijhoff and
Lusebrink.
The contribution of Reinharr Koselleck, a founder and the foremost practitioner of
Begriffigeschichte, deals with a number of key issues picked up elsewhere in this volume.
Koselleckemphasises that the claim of Begriffigeschichte is more than just another historical
specialism, as though one could have a history of concepts in the way that one might have a
history of dress, or a history of naval warfare. 'Society and language', Koselleck argues, 'are
part of the metahistorical givens without which history (Geschichte, Historie) is inconceiv-
able'. Any specialist in history must therefore come under the purview of social history and
conceptual history - and it is to the creative tension between these two that he wishes to di-
rect our attention. For 'what actually happens is clearly more than the linguistic articula-
tion that produced or inrepreced it'.
Acknowledging the linguistic Filrer through which we (and historical subjects] invariably
articulate Out experience, does not, claims Koselleck, mean that all history can be reduced
to the history oflanguage. But neither does it mean that long run demographical social sta-
tistics can be deployed in complete innocence of the conceptual categories available to the
historical agents concerned. Moreover, social history and the history of concepts each dis-
play both a diachronic and a synchronic dimension. That means each subject matter com-
prises, at anyone time a stable structure which gives meaning and identity to individual in-
stances or actions, and over time each structure displays change. The structure can be con-
ceived of as a lmguewithin which the agent is enabled to perform his or her parole. We can
conceive of an abstract concept like marriage having a persistent and meaningful referent
over a long period of time, just as we can conceive of it having particular specifications at
different times. Similarly, we can see each ceremony as a parole- a speech act - embodying
and made possible by the language of marriage. Sensitized by this historical knowledge, we
can construct long-term indices of the incidence of marriage - synchronically in terms of
their distribution amongst different social classes say, and diachronically in terms of the rise
and fall of marriage contracts. Social and conceptual history, it is claimed, are thus inter-
twined, not only in the sense that their results are complimentary, but in the much more
4 HISTORY or (ONCEI'T,
fundamental sense that neither can be practised successfully without the insighrs provided
by the other.
lain Hampsher-Monk outlines three models for practising the history of political ideas
revealed in language use, that based on the idea of distinct political languages pursued by
John Pocock, Quenrin Skinner's focus on the 'speech act' analysis ofAustin and SearIe, and
conceptual history. He sets out to emphasise the distinctive character of each, whilst ulti-
mately finding a mutually supportive relationship between the first two. His comparative
remarks stress the originally different foci of the Anglophone and Begriffigeschichte enter-
prise, the Anglophone nervousness about 'concepts' which are not yet words, and the ap-
parent incompatibility between the Anglophone stress on the need for a wide synchronic
linguistic context to be able to identify the concept and the German aspiration to extract
individual concepts from this for diachronic treatment. His final remarks advert to the em-
phasis on agency in the Anglophone history as opposed to the sense of process discovered
in Begriffigeschichte.
In his critical appraisal of Begriffigeschichte, Hans Bcdeker singles out four representative
problems connected with this distinctively German genre. Firstly, the problems of identify-
ing and selecting the various relevant fundamental Begriffi for investigation. Second there
is the problem that arises because meaning, construed, as Wingenstein enjoined us to, as
'meaning in use', refers epistemological issues to unstable empirical questions about typical
users and uses, problems exacerbated by the late-eighteenth-century explosion of reading
matter and the diversification of the reading public. A third issue - already focussed on by
Koselleck and by a number of other writers - is the relationship of concepts to a 'concrete
setting'. Begriffigeschichte is firmly rooted in, and conceived of as a contribution to, social
history; it arose at least in pan as a reaction to an older history of ideas in which the idea
was a tranvhistorical (and therefore not socio-hisroricaily specific) unit. As Koseileck made
clear in the second chapter, Begriffigeschichte, in common with French and Anglophone ap-
proaches to the history of mentalities and languages, insists on recovering the socio-hisrori-
cally embedded meaning of the concept. Yet for German Begriffigeschichte, that socio-po-
litical reality is susceptible to an epistemological approach which is relatively independent
of the awareness and concepts through which historical agents experienced it.
Bodeker traces this dichotomy not only to the lack of interdisciplinary exchange be-
tween linguistics and history in the Germany of the early Sixties, but also to the survival -
evident in many of the contributors to the project - of a predominantly philosophical tra-
dition dating back to the nineteenth century. Inasmuch as the concept of the Begriffi fails
to emancipate itself from its philosophical origins, it remains distinct and therefore exter-
nally related ro an historical reality. For the Anglophone and even more the French a more
fundamentally synthetic practice emerged in which language was political event, social
structure, etc. The resistence to the reception of French interest in the every-day mental
world as unconceprual, and of French structuralism as unhisrorical, long prevented recog-
nition of the real convergence between the two. Yet as this very collection shows, variants of
conceptual history have now started to focus on everyday texts, popular symbolism, lan-
guage, socio-hisrorical semantics and political discourse. Bodeker sees a teal international
INTRODUCTIOI' 5
synthesis emerging whereby different methods can be applied to different questions and ar-
eas of evidence on the basis of what is appropriate.
The second section of the book presents a number of exemplary studies in the history of
concepts more widely conceived. These take a number of forms which can be thought of as
ranging between two foci - the crearmenc of a particular individual concept and the treat-
ment of a particular conception of the history of concepts.
In a study which implicitly owes more to Anglophone than German methodology,
Maurizio Viroli considers the early history of a new locution in sixteenth century Italy:
ragione di stato (reason of state), a locution which in his view ushered in 'a new language'
which supported a transformed understanding of the practice and end of politics. Viroli
idemifes the sixteenth century writer Giovanni Botero performing a speech act by which
the positive connotations of both 'reason' and 'politics', previously attached to a specific
kind of rule -clirnited, law-governed and obtaining in republics - was appropriated by ab-
solute Princes (and eventually by amoral republics too) and attached to whatever practices
sustained their power. Although this exemplifies the Skinnerian programme analysed by
Hampsher-Monk in Chapter 3, there are interesting points of contact in terms of both
method and the findings of Begriffigm-hichte. In spite of what we might call his preference
for the language of 'languages', Viroli, like the practitioners of Begriffigeschichte, establishes
the scope of a concept by referring to its perceived opposites, charting conceptual change
partly through reference to changing synonyms and antonyms. As do they, Viroli explicates
'reason of state' by referring to a wider conceptual field, and like them, if less explicitly, he
holds in tension the semcsiological and onomasiological elements of analysis which enables
us to imagine the concept traversing a range of lexical possibilities.
In other studies in this section the focus shifts to the method itself; and examples be-
come secondary. Both Bernhard Scholz and Terence Ball argue for the idea of a discipline-
specific BegrifJsgeschichte or conceptual history. The domain of such a restricted conceptual
history approaches I'ocock's conception of language, and it might range from the highly
formalised - such as physics - to the more open, contested and opportunistic domain -
such as politics. Scholz's conscious separation of the subject matter of conceptual history
from the 'life-world' is only one of a number of important respects in which his characteri-
sation of it differs from that given by KoselIeck. He illusrrares his claim from the language
of literary criticism which contains both ordinary-language and technical concepts. The
project of such a specialized conceptual history is exemplified in the Reallexikon der
Daaschen LiteraturwissemchaJt, from which the changes in the connotations of 'emblem'
are chosen. Terence Ball, one of the fewAnglophone writers to actually practise conceptual
history under that name, discusses how an awareness of conceptual history (both German
and Anglophone) - which he traces ro a common awareness of the 'linguistic turn' taken by
philosophy in the twentieth century - impinges on the study of the history of political
thought. Yet Ball's conception of 'critical conceptual history' still leans towards the
Anglophone school. Although he is untroubled by a history of a concept predating any
lexical significr, he strongly identifies the history of political concepts with the history of
'the political conflicts in which they figured'. His general conception of the role to be per-
6
formed by conceptual history is [lot a totalising one, even within the history of political
thought. It is ultimately that of sensitizing us to the issues and assumptions, overtones and
prej udices - even deceits and misrepresentations - present in the language of the historical
actors whose texts we study.
Willem Frijhoff critically discusses the concept 'Cosmopclite' as presented in the
Handbuch, in relation to changing conceptions of the disciplines within which it might be
placed - conceptual history, cultural history and a social history which has increasingly
yielded its positivism to a recognition of the 'constructed' character of social reality. Hans-
Jurgen Lusebrink studies the transfer (and transformation) of the conceptual field sur-
rounding 'Nation' as it passed from Revolutionary France into Germany. In doing so he
both reveals and extends the methods of classic Begri/figeschichre. Liisebrink's study, fasci-
nating in its own right, exemplifies, how, for true Begriffigeschichte, a concept is [a position
within] a semantic field and not a lexical item. Although the content of this vocabulary
picked up peculiarly German connotations in the course of transfer, Lusebrink shows that
the Revolutionary French structure of the discourse in which it was deployed was main-
tained - using distinctive oral styles of address, adopting political catechisms and songs.
Moreover, he observes the irony that it was this very cultural transfer that created, in the
nineteenth century, the language of nationalism which increasingly denied the desirability
or even the fact of intercultural influence.
The third, and in many ways most speculative section of the book discusses the connec-
tions and affinities between words and images as possible media of conceptual histories. A
number of the contributions allude to the emblem book of Andreas Alciarus (1492-1550),
Emblematum libeilus, which provides an interesting historical licence for rhis.' Alciarus, a
celebrated philologist, also contributed to the emerging genre of books of epigrams, quota-
tions and topoi associated with the spread of humanism to a wider and less educated audi-
ence. In his case, as Bernhard Scholz explains, the epigrams were illustrated with
woodblocks and the term 'emblem" acquired the connotation of a device which linked text
and image.
This attempt to pursue the filiarions of text and image is particularly appropriate for a
programme of Dutch conceptual history, given the Netherlands' long, rich, and socially
pervasive engagement with the graphic arts. But how, exactly, might language and image be
related? Three possibilites are explored, one from the high 'official' art of Raphael. one
from bourgeois an of the Dutch seventeenth century and one from a demotic revolution-
ary art-form - the playing cards of the French Revolution.
Bram Kempers discusses the history of interpretation of Raphael's famous frescoes in the
Stanza del/a Segnatllra in the Vatican Palace, showing how conceptual confusion resulted
from successive failures to locate the work in its appropriate intellectual context. 'Context'
in this case involves a consummate union of conceptual, architectural and functional space.
The rooms containing the frescoes where the Pope held his audiences linked his religious,
political and scholarly personae, both in the sense that it was there that he discharged his
role as political and religious leader using the forms of contemporary humanism, but also
in the sense that the rooms formed an architectural space linking the Pope's political secre-
tariat, his private and public devotional space, and his considerable humanist library, With
7
secular and sacred, political and ecclesiastical, humanist and religious coordinates all inter-
secting there, the Stanza was a location of potentially devastating cultural turbulence, and
Kempers makes clear both how the frescoes drew on the existing conceptual milieux to
achieve a momentary calm, as well as how the breakdown of that milieux led to successive
misinrerpretations.
Kempers' shows Raphael's frescoes to be a focus of extraordinary conceptual intensity on
which is brought to bear the entire cultural resources of a particular society at a moment in
history. Eddy de ]ongh, by contrast, explores the more domestic world of Dutch genre
painting. He presses the case for an iconographic reading of these paintings, messing both
the taligheld - literally the 'Iinguiscic-ness' - of art and the complementary, picrorialist.
character of poetry. In the absence of contemporary theoretical treatises of genre-painting,
De ]ongh points to the widespread currency of renaissance topoilikening poetry to art, and
of the popularity of emblem books, iconologies and illustrated collections of proverbs func-
tioning almost as word-image dictionaries. He instances the reliance of numerous pictures
on some well-known phrase, proverb or poem. Whilst this is not yet conceptual history, it
provides the necessary groundwork for the creation of what might, given the overwhelming
importance and presence of art in early modern Dutch culture, turn out to be a significant
and distinctive Dutch development of it, linking conceptual iconography and
Begriffigeschichte.
The importance of emblem-books going back to Alciaros famous Emblemarum Libelius
(translated into French in 1558) and popular pictures as 'spoken writing' is also one of the
starting points for Rolf Reichardr's discussion of French revolutionary card games. These
were a deliberate adaptation of the didactic picture books used by the Catholic Church in
controlling and mobilising the semi-literate societies of post-Reformation Europe. The im-
portance of the card game is that it reveals the possibility, not simply of identifying images
and text, as De Jongh does in the case of popular art, but of going further and recovering a
structure of intended relationships and associations between key terms - a genuine seman-
tic field - which it was the task of the games to convey to semi-literate players. This field
has both an historical dimension, the representation of a version of French History, and a
socio-linguistic one, the establishment - in the player's mind - of appropriate connections,
associations and oppositions between key concepts. Rather as in snakes and ladders, land-
ing on certain fields moves one up or down; unsurprisingly landing on 'Bastille' sends you
back to the start. However, the moves go well beyond merely imprinting a manicheeistic
dichotomy of progress and reaction, important as that was. Landing on 'Varennes' sends
yOLl back to a field marked 'Law'; Landing on Monresquieu allows three more advances, on
to legislative, judiciary and executive! Moreover, Reichardr uncovers yet another layer of
conceptual connections identified not with the movement of players in the game, but with
its iconography, which draws together three discrete, bipolar semantic fields 'Bastille',
'Francia' and 'Rights of Man', each comprising a number of concepts or events.
Martin van Celdereo's epilogue reviews some of our major themes. A Dutch-educated
historian of ideas who is an author from the Cambridge stable, has taught in Berlin, and
now holds a chair in Sussex, he perhaps knows more than most of the contributors to this
volume what it is to be situated 'between Cambridge and Heidclbcrg'. Pursuing the
8 HTSTORY or (:ONCEPTS
polarities of text and image, Begriffigeschlchte and the history of political languages, in-
volves, he suggests, coming to recognise not only their methodological exclusivity, but their
logical interdependence within any plausible historical hermeneurics - a point anticipated
by Terence Ball's chapter. Moreover, as he more than hints, for practising historians there
are pragmatic considerations: as well as the methodological clarity of the 'Cambridge' pre-
scriptions, its publications are undoubtedly 'a success'.
This concern with practical outcomes may well be a final 'peculiarity of the Dutch'
which we should acknowledge here. For in addition to their role as cultural brokers, and in
addition to the intimacy they have fostered between text and image, the Dutch are inclined
to be practical, and even in an area as abstract as the history of conceprs seem unlikely to be
inhibited by unresolved tensions between the methodological recipes adopted by their
neighbours. Whether such a pudding will he proved in the eating must await the publica-
tion of the exciting substantive volumes on individual Dutch concepts which are now in
preparation, and to which this volume serves as a prologue and inrroducrion.'
9
PART I
Theoretical and Comparative
Frameworks
CHAPTER 1
The Historiography ofGerman
Begriffsgeschichte and the Dutch
Project ofConceptual History
rIM DEN BOER
It is no coincidence that the study of basic historical concepts first developed in Germany. I
In the nineteenth century, after all, German philosophers were already interested in the his-
tory of philosophical terms. In theological faculties, the pracrioners of Dogmengeschichte-
the history of dogma - devoted anennon to the history of words and concepts.' The thor-
ough studies by F.e. Baur and his students in Tubingen on the use of such theological
concepts, such as religio and gnosis exemplifies this approach. At the end of the nineteenth
century, pretentious theories were even contrived in which conceptual history was granted
a central position and mathematical figures demonstrated the complex and ambivalent re-
lations between the concepts with seeming precision.
In the tradition of the Geisteswissemchafien propagated by Dilrhey, a great deal of atten-
tion has been devoted to rhe history of the formation of philosophical and literary con-
cepts. As one member of this venerable family, the first volume of Arcnio fur
Begriffigeschichte was primed in 1955; a series published by cultural philosopher Erich
Rorhacker with the aim of providing material for a European Gtistesgeschichte.
Even though the pre-war emphasis on what was 'typically German' had been replaced by
an approach in which common elements occupy a central position in the various national
traditions, the work of Rothacker et al., with his emphasis on the congruity of the history
of ideas was in keeping with the tradition of philosophical idealism. His point of departure
was the question of the extent to which the vocabulary and the problems of European and
American philosophy had maintained continuity with Greek and Hellenistic thinking.
This entailed an understanding of the impact of translating the Greek corpus into Latin, of
Christian and Muslim thought, of modern physics and natural law, of the Reformation and
Counter-Reformation, as well as rheir incorporation into modern national cultures..l
Rorhacker was convinced of rhe need to study kulturphilosophische Grundbegriffi and rec-
ommended that thorough research be conducted into the application of concepts from one
branch of science into another, and the relared changes in meaning; a theme to which tra-
ditional philosophical dictionaries failed to devote any attention.
In Germany, prior to the publication of the Geschichtliche Grundbegriffi, there was con-
sequently a rich tradition of conceptual history. Research was not confined to the history of
THE HIS"!"(lRJOl;Il.Ai'HY OF GERMAN BECRIHSCESCHICHTF. 13
philosophical concepts, it also addressed the fields of theology, science, literature, politics,
an and culture.
The Role of Koselleck
Attention has been drawn to the continuity which characterizes the Geschichtliche
Grundbegriffi. This is exemplified by the fact that each of the seven volumes is adorned
with the names of the three founding editors, Ono Brunncr, Werner Come and Reinhardc
Koselleck. Koselleckespecially must have devoted an incredible amount of time and energy
to the lexicon. After the death of the other rwo, he was left with the job of completing the
project.
Koselleck's most important achievement, however, pertains to the contents. From a
historiographic point of view, his work constitutes a link between the hermeneutic histori-
cal tradition in the humanities and modern social history. It was of fundamental signifi-
cance for the conception of the Geschichtiichc Grulldbegriffe that Kose!leck was able to
make Brunner's idea of a Satteizeit operational by formulating four fundamental working
hypotheses to serve as guidelines.
Koselleck, born in 1923 and thus twenty-five years younger than Brunner and thirteen
years younger than Come, studied history, philosophy and constitutional law at Heidel-
berg. In 1968, he was appointed professor at Heidelberg. and in 1971 at the new campus
university in Biclefeld, which came to be eponymously linked to modern German social
history. The GesclJlchtiiche Grundbegriffi was published when Koselleck was at Bielefeld,
but his interest in conceptual history dates back to his Heidelberg period.
In his dissertation, Preussen zunschen Reform und Revolution. AIIgemeines Landrecht.
Verwaftung und soziale Bewegung non 1791 his 1848 (1965), Koselleckwas already trying to
link political and social history. In this study, with Ccnzc as supervisor, Prussian property
law was viewed as the embodiment of a social theory. After 1791 citizenship was redefined
and property ownership and gtoup membership were replaced by individual rights. As a re-
suit, at the beginning of the nineteenth century Prussia had extremely modern legislation
and an extremely modern administration. This reform was terminated in 1848, after which
point a reaction ensued. For his study, Koselleck consulted a wide variety oflegal and offi-
cial documents, thus maintaining an objective distance from the traditional history of po-
litical ideas as was practised by [he great historian l-ncdrich Meinecke, who in his opinion
had removed himself too far from historical reality.
In his years at Heidelberg. Koselleckwas less inspired by historians than by philosophers
such as Gadamar, whose renowned seminars were also regularly attended by Heidegger.'
His views on time and the conception of time were to exert a decisive influence on
Koselleck's ideas about the fundamental change in the consciousness of time, in the
'historicization' of the world view, and the accompanying focus on the future by modern
society.These insights were to be at the foundation of one of the working hypotheses of the
Geschichtfiche Grundbegriffi.
In the field of political science, Kcselleck was influenced by Carl Schmitt. The work of
this political theoretician, appointed professor in Berlin III 1933 and dishonourably dis-
14 HISTORY Or COr-:CEl'TS
missed 11l 1945, controversial as critic ot Versailles, the Weimar Republic and the League of
Nations, reviled as admirer of the National Socialist state and defender of the 'Kampf der
deutsche Rechtswissenschaft wider dell judischen Ceisr',' exerted a direct influence on the
conceptual history pUt into practice in the Gacbicbdicbe Grundbegriffi.
In his historical works, or so Koselleck held, Schmin sought the meaning of words by
locating them in their proper historical context. Koselleck referred in this connection to
Schmin's book on the concept of dictatorship." The formulation was a neutral one, After
all. in Schmin's viewsuch political concepts as 'Staat", 'Republik'. 'Gesellschaft' or 'Klasse'
have a fundamentally polemic meaning. They are ultimately Freund-Feind-Gruppierungen
that are granted meaning in times of war or revolution, and then become empty, ghost-like
abstractions as soon as the situation changes? The concept of 'Sraar' should similarly be
viewed as a modern, nineteenth-century prcpagandistic concept that can not be applied to
earlier times. Nor, Schmin held, can terms like 'Souveranitat', 'Rechtsstaar', 'Absolutismus',
'Diktarur', 'Plan', and 'neutraler oder totaler Staat" be comprehended if one does not con-
cretely know who is being combated, overlooked or refuted with the word.
Schmirr should be viewed as one of the spiritual fathers of the Gescbicbtlicbe Grundbe-
griffi, at any rate according to Koselleck, who emphasized in this connection the work of
his co-editor Brunner, in which Schmitt was indeed awarded a prominent role." In particu-
lar, Schmirr's Verfassungslehre (1928) which can be viewed as an historical reaction to the
usual formalistic political and legal studies, was of great significance to the development of
political and social conceptual history"
Koselleck made multifarious contributions to the Gachicbdiche Grundbegriffe. He wrote
the introduction, published four of the seven volumes, and was the author or co-author of
numerous entries.'? More important perhaps than these concrete contributions were the
working hypotheses Koselleck formulated, which were at the foundation of his political
and social conception. It was these hypotheses, all four of which pertained to the effects of
the socieral changes that took place in the period from 1750 to 1850 on the political and
social vocabulary, that enabled the Gescbidne Grundbegriffe to dearly distinguish itself from
older specimens of conceptual history.
Koselleck's working hypotheses, designed to influence the direction of the research, can
be summarized by four terms; Politisiervng, Demokratisierung. ldeoloeieierbarkeit and
Verzeitlichung. The terms poliricizacion and democratization refer to the increasingly politi-
cal meaning and the growing social scope of concepts. 'Ideologisability' pertains to the de-
gree to which concepts become part of a philosophical and social system of concepts. The
last term, Verzeitlichung, refers to a changing conception of time. Concepts that tradition-
ally expressed a static situation are used more and more to describe processes. They are at-
tributed with a retrospective and a prospective dimension, a past and a future. The suffix
'isarion' -liberalisation, democratisation - gives many words a new, dynamic dimension.
'Staat' is a good example. According to Koselleck, it was in the Sattelzeit that this con-
cept first came to exhibit a dynamic nature. Not only was the notion taken into account
that the state was the driving force and the embodiment of progress, the concept also be-
came an inextricable component of sometimes contradictory views of society. Lastly, the
rHE HISTORIOCRAPHY OF GERl\lAN RECRIFFSCESCHICHTE 15
process of poliricisation and democratisation also played a role in the development of the
concept.
Despite Koselleck's antagonistic stance visavis the traditional German Geistesgeschichte,
his contributions ro the Gescbicbtliche Grundbegrifje unmistakably revealed the inspiration
of historicism. How revealing it was when he said he had re-read Meinecke's celebrated
work, Die Idee der Staatsrdson, without finding anything useful in it for his entry on 'Sraar'
in the Gescbicbtlicbe Grundbegriffi.
Koselleck's writing style is abstract and sometimes even cryptic. He speaks of words as
entities that have a 'life-span' and 'vital properties' and are equipped with a 'temporal inter-
nal structure'. The article about the development of the term 'Krise' is illustrative in this
connection. Originally a scholarly concept, at the end of the eighteenth century, according
to Koselleck, it came to have a religious, apocalyptic connotation. The term was then ap-
plied to revolutionary events and was linked to history. Aufgrund seiner rneraphorischen
Vieldeurigkeir und Dehnbarkeir beginnt der Begriff zu schillern. Er dringt in die
Allragssprachc ein und wird zum Schlagwort'.'! Around 1780, again according to
Koselleck, a new perception of time emerged. The concept of 'Krise' became a factor and
an indicaror of the transition to the new epoch and, judging from its growing use, it must
have reinforced itself. But the expression remained 'vielschichtig und unklar wie die
Emotionen die sich an ihn hangen'. Lastly, the term 'Krise' was described as 'anschlussfahig'
and 'anscblussbedurfng', ambivalent in specifying meaning and seeking meaning alike,
relativelyvague and interchangeable with unrest, conflict and revolution. Thus the use of a
word can in itself be viewed as a symptom of a histoncal crisis with no precise purpose.
'Die alrc Kraft des Begriffs',11 which provided an unrepeatable, firm and non-interchange-
able meaning has vanished into the obscurity of desired alternatives. That is impressively
formulated, but words thus seem to have become entities that lead a life of their own.
Conze's Diligence
With his more practical interest in social history, Werner Come was an ideal complement
to Koselleck's focus on philosophical history. Conze's name is linked to the introduction of
the social history of the industrialized world to Germany. He was one of the founders of
the Arbeitskreis fUr mndeme SoziaLgeschithte, which scheduled and financed the large-scale
project 'begrtffs- und wongeschichclicher Unrersuchungen' in 1958.'' In an organizational
sense Conze, a Heidelberg professor since 1957, was an empire builder. It was especially in
this capacity that he was the driving force behind the Gachicbtlichc GrundbegrifJe. He was
the engine behind the project, edited three of the seven volumes and wrote many of the en-
tries himself; particularly those dealing with the social political concepts in modern and
contemporary history." Conze viewed concepts as indicators of social groups, of the
stratification of society, and of political conduct. To him, conceptual history was primarily
social history.
Come's important role in writing and editing the Gcschicbtliche GrundbegrifJe should be
viewed as a logical outcome of his interest in industrialized society. In an impressive obiru-
16 HISTORYOF CO"CFI'TS
ary entitled 'Tradition and Innovation', Koselleck tried to give an Impression of what
Conze meant intellectually to the practice of social hisrory.!' Conze, who was born in 1910
and died III 1986, studied at Kcnigsberg. the German outpost in eastern Prussia, with
Hans Rothfels (b. 1891), a student of Meinecke's, and with sociologist and demographer
Gunther Ipsen (1899). Since he was Jewish, Rorhfels had to resign in 1934.
16
Come took
his Ph.D. that same year with a sociographic analysis of a linguistic island of German-
speaking peasants that had developed in the Baltic region in the eighteenth century." In
1940, also under Ipsen'ssupervision, but this time in Vienna, he submitted his professorial
dissertation entitled Agrarverftssung und Bevoikerung in Litauen und Weissrussiand. Despite
the predominant political climate, neither Conze's Ph.D. nor his professorial dissertation
exhibited any nationalistic or racist tendencies, or so Koselleck holds; and anyone familiar
with the historiography of the day can not help but express 'Hochachcung' for his meth-
odological sobriety."
Come's interest was primarily in the Strukturgeschichte des technisch-industrietlen Zeitaleers.
a form of hisroriography that in the first instance seemed to bear a marked resemblance to
that of the Annala in France. However, according to Koselleck, there was one difference:
Conze's structural history focused on the present, while the French historians screened them-
selves ofTfrom the political situation of their day and confined their research field to the pe-
riod before the Revolution. 'Conze was not open to nostalgia', Koselleck wrote, suggestively
drawing a distinction between Braudels reaction to the French Scheitern 1940 and Ccnze's
reaction to the Deutsche Kateurophe 1945.'1 Perhaps there is a connection between the per-
sonal and scientific positions. Braudel experienced the fall of France encamped along the
Maginot Line and wrote LaMcditerranee ss a German prisoner of war, while Come took part
in the Russian campaign, fought until the bitter end, and returned, wounded, escaped as a
Russian prisoner of war. Academically speaking, Conze and Braudcl worked within totally
different traditions. Without wishing to detract from Conze's work and his significance re-
garding the practice of social history in Cermany, it should be noted that the historiographic
impact of LaMedirermnee is of quite a different magnitude."
Brunner's Influence
On various occasions, Conze and Koselleckboth acknowledged their intellectual indebted-
ness to Ono Brunner, their older felloweditor who was born in 1898 and studied with the
renowned Viennese mediaevalist A1fons Dopsch (1868-1953).:'1 According to Conze, who
considered it to be a classic prelude to his own lexicographical work, Brunner had made
clear how absolutely necessary conceptual history was to historical analysis in his Land und
Herrschaft (1939/1959). Brunner took a firm stance against the notions of men like Georg
von Below, Ono von Gierke and Ono Hinrze who, in his opinion, adhered to a modern
(anachronistic) conception of the state in the study of medieval history." Koselleck, in
turn, alluded to the importance of Brunner's work in connection with the introduction of
conceptual history as a methodological instrument to distinguish the threshold between
old and modern legal history around 1800.2\
THF HISTORI()(;I{Al'HY CERMAN 17
Unlike Conze's work, Brunner's clearly bore the stamp of the era in which it was written.
While the post-war editions of Land und Herrschafi had as sub-title Grundfragen der
territorialen Verfizssungsgeschichte Osterreichs im Mittelalter. the first (1939) and second edi-
tion (I942) referred to Grundfragen der territorialm Verfizssungsgeschichte Siidostdeutsch-
lands im Mitrelalter and were interspersed with Great-Germanic phrases and National So-
cialist references. Stunner concluded his volume by expressing the hope that his study,
limited as it was in time and space, might be attributed with some special meaning in con-
nection with 'die polirischen Grundbegriffe des Drinen Reichs, Fuhrung und
Volksgemein-schafc [die]letzdich nur aus germaniscben Grundlagen zu versrehen [sind]'."
Brunner, promoted in 1941 from a professor with a specially named chair, to an ordi-
nary professor at the University of Vienna, and dismissed III the EntnaziJizierung, was ap-
pointed again III 1954, but now III Hamburg." A new edition of Land und Herrschafiwas
published five years later; all the traces of 'polirische Bedingrheir' had been removed, as
Koselleck commented. After world war two, Brunner also followed Ccnze's example in us-
ing the term Strukturgesc!nchte instead of Volksgeschichte.
26
Brunner already bore witness to this altered mentality in Adeliges Landleben und
Europiiischer Geist, a 1949 study of the life and work of a seventeen rh-century Austrian rto-
bleman who wrote poetry and works on farming. The orientation was no longer Great-
Germanic but pan-European, although the purport of his work was consistent with earlier
studies. The Europe of yore, the world as it was prior to the Enlightenment and the Revo-
lution, could not be analysed with nineteenth-century concepts, or so Brunner felt. The
battle between Feudalismus and the Bourgeoisie was over." The notion of 'feudalism' as a
'system of oppression and exploitation' had been introduced by officials of the absolutist
state and adopted by SCientists and journalists alike in the nineteenth century, but was
clearly due for revision.
In later publications, Stunner and his students continued to stress the gap separating us
from the Europe of the Ancien Regime and the meaning of the social and conceptual up-
heaval between 1750 and 1 8 5 ~ ~ He felt it was erroneous to assume medieval and early
modern history could be interpreted III terms of the nineteenth and twentieth-century
Staatsiehre or political theories. It would be an illusion to believe, however, that the histo-
rian can do his job without using modern concepts of this kind. The historian ought how-
ever to realize what he is doing when he uses modern concepts, and should ask himself
whether they are appropriate for describing and interpreting the sources.")
In the end, Stunner was to write only one entry in the Geschichtiiche Grundbegriffe, the
one on 'Peudalismus'." Still, his intellectual influence should not be underestimated. He
was the one, after all, who convincingly demonstrated the inadequacy of modern political
terminology for historical analysis and conceived the idea of a Sattelzeitas fundamental di-
viding line.
A Conceptual History Handbuch for France
In the Eighties, even before the Gacbicbtliche Grundbegrijfi was completed, one of
Kosclleck's students, Rolf Reichardt, launched a comparable conceptual history project for
18 HISTURYOF (;(IN(:EI'TS
France. The series, fifteen volumes of which were published from 1985 to 1993, is entitled
Handbuch politiscb-sosialer Grundbegriffe in Frankreich 1680-1820. Here again, the notion
of a Sattelzeit plays a central role. However, in France its start was dated around 1680,
about three quarters of a century earlier than in Germany.
This is not the only difference. The entries in the Handbuch cover a shorter period than
the ones in the Geschichtliche Gnmdbegriffi, which go back to classical times. Another dif-
ference is the serial approach, in which the influence can be detected of the French quanti-
tative mentality history such as that of Michel Vovelle who bases his work on comparably
extensive serial sources. The Handbuch also devotes more attention to the socieral range
and social function of concepts. Habermas' influence can be distinguished in the attention
devoted to communicative dimensions and the problems of public life and public opinion.
Although the Handbuch may well have been set up along the same lines as the Gocbicbt-
fiche Grundbegriffi, the atmosphere it evokes is quite different. The Gachichtliche
Grundbegrijje is visibly rooted in German historiographic and philosophical traditions
which are perceived as enigmatic and provoke reflection and contemplation. This is not
only expressed in passages on the influence of National Socialism on the development of
various concepts, but at other points as well. In his ruminations on early periods, there was
evidence that Koselleck, for example, was well aware of the horrendous absurdity of mod-
ern history. A certain desire to construct a political pathology in order to come to terms
with the political afflictions they themselves had experienced can be discerned in the
Gescbicbtlicbe Grundbegriffe.
The Handbuch is dearly the work of members of a younger generation with a profes-
sional, chronologically limited sphere of interest. In the work of Reichardr (b.1942) et al.
who did not consciously experience the Third Reich, the traumas of the older generation
are no longer felt. There are no links to modern social and political vocabulary, let alone in-
terest in the political pathology of the twentieth century. Reichardt and his post-war col-
leagues focus on the media and communication, though the Handbuch does not contain
figures on circulations, distribution, or user frequency.
With all the difference in style, approach and sources inevitable in a collective work of
these dimensions, one can not but conclude that a large number of the entries in the Hand-
buehbarely comply, if at all, with the social historical programme Reichardr formulates in
the Introduction to the series. Reichardr begged to differ from the older notions in the his-
tory of ideas he felt were being adhered to in the Gescbicbtliche Grundbegriffi. Lengthy
quotes from well-known authors were strung together, he noted, disregarding the question
how representative they were of society." The criticism was to the point, but it also per-
tained to many of the entries in his own Handbuch.
In other respects too, the comparison between the Handbuch and the Gcschicbtlicbe
Grundbegriffi does not solely favour the Handbuch. Although more systematic in design,
the pieces in the Handbuch generally have less philosophical depth. Very little of the writ-
ing in the Handbuch is of the quality of Kosclleck's articles in the Gescbicbdiche
Grundbegriffi which are thorough and meaningful in a social historical sense and serve as
an incentive for further research.
I'IIE 11ISTORIOGRAI'HY (;f!I.MAN llE(;R1HSCESCH1UHI' 19
The difference in orientation also manifests itself in how the selection of the basic con-
cepts to be included was accounted for. Koselleck based the selecrion of a hundred and
twenty-five concepts upon research in dictionaries, hut acknowledged the fact that to a de-
gree, the selection was subjective. The distinction between basic and ordinary concepts was
a gradual one, or so Koselleck held, and not based upon linguistic criteria, but on a 'prag-
matic differentiation in time' and on differences In complexiry" Reichardr similarly based
the selection of a hundred and fifty-eight concepts for the Handbucb on prior lexicographic
research in dictionaries and encyclopedias." In his effort to defend this selection as objec-
tive, the somewhat naive positivist tendency that was so characteristic of the innovative,
quantitatively oriented historiography of the Seventies is evident.
The desire to provide an objective basis for the selection and status of the basic concepts
was why the Handbuch articulated at greater length than the Gescbicbtliche Grundbegriffe
the utilization of source material and the methods deployed. The treatment of the concept
'pbilosophe' is illustrative here. This entty briefly outlines why it is a fundamental concept,
after which the Enlightenment is described in the form of a reconstruction of the history of
the concepts 'philosophe' and 'philosophic' from the emergence of the self-image
'philosophe' as an acting subject in a context that was still feudal, where the court set the
tone, to a professional role for the philosopher in bourgeois society, for which the Empire
constituted the institutional basis."
A comparison of these two standard works also reflects other recent changes in historio-
graphy. Starting with the first volume, the Handbuch focused more interest on the concepts
of cultural history, whereas the Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe showed no acknowledgement
of such shifts in interest until the list of desiderata, formulated by Kosellcck in the last vol-
ume, which was published in 1992. This list nor only includes concepts such as 'Dienst',
'Gliick', 'Pflicht', 'Ordnung', "Ireue' and 'Tugend', it also features names of groups, names
of institutions, and social fields;" ln addition to older terms from the field of theology and
anthropology, such as 'Glauhe', 'Heil', 'Hoffnung. 'Liebe', 'Held', 'Opfer'. 'Leben', 'Tod',
'Erionerung' and 'Ienzeirs', the lisr also includes contemporary key words such as 'Informa-
rion' and 'Kommunikarion' and terms from the field of ecology. The list can be expanded,
according to Koselleck, hut remains limited, since the basic concepts that have been coined
and have come to represent a body of experiences are finite."
A Dutch Project
There are various conditions that can make a study of the emergence of basic concepts in
the Dutch language interesting: the early economic development, the high degree of ur-
banisation, the increasingly bourgeois social structure, the religious diversity, the lack of a
dominant court culture and the distinctive federal political system. The rise of the Republic
of the Seven United Netherlands was observed in Europe with awe and emy. In the seven-
teenth century, for some time the Republic played a leading role in Europe politically and
milirarily, as well as economically and culturally.
20 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
In a wide range of fields, such as trade, ship-building and banking as well as in scientific
practice and technological advances, the Dutch language played a major role. It is true that
a great deal was still written in Latin, and that French was in fashion, but it would be
wrong to underestimate the importance people attached to the Dutch language at that
time. As was the case in other countries in Western Europe, starting in the mid-sixteenth
century, numerous authors emphasized the value of the national language. There was a
whole movement that pursued the advancement and purification of the Dutch language,
with the introduction of new words and the recoining of old terms." A good exemple of
this movement was Simon Srevin. In his VitaPolitica - Het Burgherlijk Leven (Vita Polirica
- Civil Life'), a striking work conceived in a kind of Cartesian style avant la lettre, Stevin
propagated the use of Dutch concepts in politics and science, alluding to the misunder-
standings resulting from the use of terms like 'monarchy'. He introduced several new
Dutch terms to refer to science and political life in the Low Lands. 18 Several of these neolo-
gisms became common expressions in Dutch, as was noted in a late seventeenth-century re-
print of Srevin's work."
\Xfhen a study is involved with the origins and development of concepts, the historian
could not wish for a better point of departure than debates of this kind. Caution is, how-
ever, called for in precisely this point. In conceptual history, there is an almost inevitable
tendency to attach a great deal of value to statements by contemporaries on the use of
words, the introduction of new terms, or shifts in meaning. However, it is not always clear
what value should be attributed to these individual statements, no matter how apt they
might be, in assessing day-to-day language usage. And how, except for a series of sources
that can easily be traced, can the effect be determined of the movement for the propagation
of the national language in the second half of the sixteenth century? Moreover, what value
can be attached to the vast number of purist discourses dating back to the beginning of the
nineteenth century that were opposed to the growing influence of the French language in
Germany and the Netherlands. After all, opinions of this kind can just as easily be inter-
preted as expressions of linguistic purism or as politically or moralistically motivated argu-
ments.
The current study of Dutch concepts was not only considered to be valuable in itself, it
was also thought to be a constructive complement to the research on German and French
concepts. The Dutch project, that started in the early Nineties, identified a small group of
concepts for study. It has proceeded on somewhat different pre-suppositions from the Ger-
man projects. A comparative approach was required, and an exclusively national perspec-
tive was to be avoided. The study of Dutch concepts should also discard the German fixa-
tion on the Sdttelzeitwhich can be viewed as a result of Car! Schmirr's and Ono Brunner's
VerfilHungsgeschichte. Of course, not every period is equally fertile in the creation of words,
and every language changes, just as every era changes. But it can not be denied that in the
field of politicization, the Renaissance was at least as rich in 'semantic turning points' as the
Enlightenment. At any rate in Dutch, the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century, a
period of extreme poliricization, totally in keeping with Kosellecks hypotheses, constitutes
a kind of proto-Sattelzeit that was to be decisive for the political system and conceptual
structure. The semantics of the Dutch Revolt is a fascinating subject that - especially after
THE HIsrOR10CRAl'HYOF (;rRMAN BEGRIHSGESCHICHTf 21
the 'linguistic turn' - deserves further study.?'' What was true of earlier eras is just as true of
later transition periods. The second half of the nineteenth century, for example, character-
ized as it was by democratisation and ideologisarion. has also been taken as a period that
deserves intensive investigation,
Discarding the idea of a late-eighteenth-century Stttteluit and opting for a longer period
of time, away from the chronology of the Geschfchtliche Grundbegriffe and the Handbucb,
would, we considered, ultimately make the project more viable. This need for a pragmatic
approach and consideration of different periods gives the Dutch project a flexible form
and a wide scope. One might think of a series of studies of varying lengths and forms,
much along the lines of Rorhacker's ArchivfUr Begriffigeschichte. In essence, the Dutch
project would then be taking the advice Koselleck himself gave in 1990: in the course of
time, the alphabetical order, or so he felt, had come to be an encumbrance to the
Ceschichtliche
The necessity for team work was considered a second practical consequence of a more
comprehensive approach. People who specialized in different periods were required to join
together to study a certain concept or a number of related concepts. Byway of an experi-
ment, three work groups were set up a few years ago on the concepts Fatherland, Freedom
and Civilization." This type of team work provides ample opportunity to invite specialists
from various disciplines, but requires good working procedure and methodology.
The Dutch project should avoid an exclusive focus on the national language. It might
strive to compare concepts in Dutch with related concepts in other languages in the same
period. As a small language, surrounded by French, German and English, Dutch was open
to these influences. '(Our language) might impede us in penetrating the world with our
word', Huizinga said, 'bur it keeps us impartial, it gives us a mirror to catch whatever is al-
ien'." Isn't that quite a privileged position for a comparative perspective?
22 HISTORYDJ' CO;.JCEPTS
CHAPTER. 2
Social History andBegriffsgescbicbte!
REINHART KOSElLECK
Those of us who are concerned with history- whatever that may be - and define it as social
history, clearly restrict the themes we address. And those of us who specify history as
Begriffsgeschichte Ot the history of concepts clearly do the same. Yet the two are ways of
catagorizing history as a whole: they point away from the delimitation of those specialist
histories of which it consists. The economic history of England, for example, or the diplo-
matic history of the early modern period or church history in the West are the sort of spe-
cial fields that present themselves and are worth studying from material, temporal and re-
gional perspectives. They represent, then, particular aspects of the past.
It IS a different matter with social history and Begrijfigeschichte. Arising from their very
theoretical self-justification emerges a claim to a universality that may extend to and com-
pass all historical specialisms. For what history does not deal with the relationships between
human beings, with all forms of social intercourse or with social stratifications, so that the
designation social history may stake an irrefutable - as it were, anthropological - perma-
nent claim that lies behind every form of history? Moreover, what history could exist that
did not have to be conceived as such before developing into history? In this way, the study
of concepts and their linguistic history is as much a minimum requirement for the very rec-
ognition of history as the definition that it deals with human society
Historical Overview
Both social history and Begriffigeschichte have existed as explicit approaches since the En-
lightenment and its discovery of the historical world: that age when the social formations
that had existed up until that point began to crumble and, at the same time, linguistic re-
flection fell under the transformative pressure of a history that was itself experienced and
articulated as novel. If one follows the history of historical reflection and representation
since that period, one encounters both approaches time and again, whether they are mutu-
ally elucidating, as in Vico, Rousseau or Herder, or go their own separate ways.
From the philosophical histories of the Enlightenment down to Comte and the young
Marx, theorists set themselves the task of tracing all historical life manifestations to, and
deriving them from, social conditions. They were followed, but already with more positiv-
ist methods, by the nineteenth-century histories of society and civilization, of culture and
SOCIAL HISTORYAND BEGRIFfSCESCHICHTE 23
peoples down to the regional histories encompassing all spheres of existence, the synthetic
achievements of which, from Maser to Gregorovius and Lamprecht, may with justification
be called social-historical.
On the other hand, since the eighteenth century there have also been consciously-fo-
cused histories of concepts' - the term Begriffigeschichte apparently comes from Hcgel -
which gained a permanent place in histories of language and in historical lexicography.
Naturally, they were addressed by all disciplines using historical philological methods
which are obliged to verify their sources by means of herrneneutic approaches. Each trans-
lation into one's respective present implies a history of concepts whose methodological in-
evitability Rudo!f Eucken demonstrated in an exemplary fashion for all of the humanities
and social sciences in his Gescbicbte derphilosophischen Termmologie..1
In research practice, we also find mutual references everywhere which combine the
analyses of social and constitutional history in particular with issues from Begriffigeschichte.
Their shared context was always more Ot less apparent in Classical and Medieval studies.
After all, particularly when sources on the ground are scarce, what subject matter could be
understood without knowledge of the means of its conceptualization in the past and in the
present? Certainly, it is striking that the mutual interdependence of social history and
Begriffigeschichte only came to be studied systematically in the 1930s; one thinks here of
Waiter Schlesinger and especially of Ono Brunner. In the neighboring fields the moving
forces were Rothacker in philosophy, Carl Schmirr in jurisprudence and Jost Trier in [in-
gUIstics.
As a matter of scholarly politics, the alliance between social history and Begriffigeschichte
took up arms against two very different tendencies, both of them dominant in the 1920s.
On the one hand, the aim was to abandon concepts drawn from intellectual history and
the history of ideas which had been pursued outside of their socio-political context, so to
speak for their own sake. On the other, history was to be engaged in, not primarily as a
chronicle of political events, but rather as a search for their longer-term preconditions.
As Ono Brunner emphasized in the preface to the second edition of his Land and Lord-
ship," he wanted to 'enquire after the concrete preconditions of medieval politics, bur not
portray the politics themselves'. He was interested in shifting the focus to the durable struc-
tures of social constitution and their - never merely momentary - transformation, and to
do so by devoting sepatate attention to the various linguistic self-articulations of social
groups, organizations and strata, as well as the history of their interpretation. Furthermore,
it is no accident that the Annates, which emerged from an analogous research interest, insti-
tuted the rubric 'Things and Words' in 1930. For Lucien Febvre and Marc Bloch, linguistic
analysis was an integral part of their social historical research. In Germany, the trailblazer
for modern history was Gunther Ipsen who supplemented his SOCial historical- particularly
demographic - research with linguistic studies. Werner Conze took up these inspirations
when he founded the Arbeitskreis fur moderne Sozialgeschichte (Study-Group for Modern
Social History) in 1956-57.' Thanks to Conze's initiative, the attempt to link questions
from social history and Begriffigeschichte forms pan of the Study-Croup's ongoing chal-
lenge, and with it the definition of the differences between the two approaches, which will
be discussed below.
24 HL'i"l"ORY 01' CONCEPTS
The Impossibility of an 'Histoire Totale'
There can be no history, no historical experience or interpretation, no representation or
narrative without social formations and the concepts by means of which - whether reflex-
ively or self-reflexively - they define their challenges and seek to meet them. To this extent
society and language belong to the metahisrorical givens without which history (Geschichte,
Historiei is inconceivable. For this reason the theories, questions and methods of social his-
tory and Begriffigeschichte apply to all imaginable fields of historical scholarship. It is for
this same reason, though, that the desire to envision a 'total history' occasionally raises its
head. If empirical studies by practitioners of social history and Bcgriffigeschichte treat cir-
cumscribed topics for reasons of scholarly pragmatism, this self-restriction by no means di-
minishes the claim to universality that proceeds from a theory of a possible history, which
must in any case presuppose society and language.
The demands of specialization dictated by methodology compel us to apply the ap-
proaches of social history and Begriffigeschichte in an interdisciplinary manner. This does
not mean, however, that their theoretical claim to universality could be posited as absolute
or total. To be sure, they are under pressure to presuppose the totality of social relationships
as well as their linguistic articulations and systems of interpretation. However, the formally
irrefutable premise that all history has to do with society and language does not permit the
farther-reaching conclusion that it is possible, as regards content, to write or even merely
envision a 'total history'.
As numerous and plausible as the empirical objections to a total history may be, a fur-
ther objection to its possibility follows from the very attempt to conceive of it. For the to-
tality of a history of society and the totality of a history of language can never be projected
wholly onto each other, Even assuming the empirically unattainable case in which the two
fields could be treated as a finite, restricted totality, an unbridgeable difference would re-
main between any social history and the history of its conceptualization.
Linguistic understanding neither catches up with what happens or was actually the case,
nor does anything happen that has not already been altered by its linguistic processing. So-
cial history and Begriffigeschichte are in a state of historically determined tension which re-
fers the one to the other without any possibility of the tension ever being lifted. What you
do today, only the next day can tell you, and what you say becomes an event by withdraw-
ing from you. What happens berween people or in society and what is said during or about
this produces an ever-changing difference that hinders any 'hisroire rotalc'. History takes
place in anticipation of incompleteness; and any adequate interpretation of it must there-
fore renounce totality.
A characteristic of historical time is its constant reproduction of the tension between so-
ciety and its transformation on the one hand, and its linguistic adaptation and processing
on the other. All history feeds on this tension. Social relationships, conflicts and their solu-
tions, and the changing preconditions for them are never congruent with the linguistic ar-
ticulations on the basis of which societies act, understand, interpret, change and re-form
themselves. This thesis will be tested in rwo cases: firstly, in relation to history occuring in
SOCIAL HISTORY AND BEGRIFFSGESCHICHTF. 25
actu(geschehende Geschichte), and secondly, in relation to history that has already occurred
in the past (geschehene Geschichte).
Geschehende Geschichte, the Spoken and theWritten Word
When social history and Begri/figeschichre are related to each other the definition of differ-
ence involved reciprocally relanvizes their respective claims to universality. History neither
becomes one with the manner in which it is conceived, nor is it conceivable without it.
In everyday events, rhe connection between the two is indissolubly given. As creatures
gifted with language, human beings cannot, after all, be separated from the origins of rheir
social existence. How might we determine the relationship? What is comparatively clear IS
the dependence of each individual event in the course of its occurrence upon its linguistic
facilitation. No social activity, political argument or economic transaction is possible with-
Out verbal exchange, planning discussions, public debate or secret discussions, without or-
ders - and obedience to them - the consensus of participants or the expressed dissent of the
quarreling parties. Any history of everyday life in daily performance depends upon lan-
guage in performance, upon speech and conversation; just as no love story is conceivable
without at least three words: you, I, we. Every social occurrence in its multiple contexts
tests on communicative groundwork and is the result of linguistic mediation. Institutions
and organizations, from the smallest club to the UN, rely upon them, whether in spoken or
written form.
However obvious this may be, this observation is equally obviously in need of qualifica-
tion. What actually happens is dearly more than the linguistic articulation that produced
or interprets it. The order or mutual resolution or elemental shout to kill are not identical
to the act of killing itself. The expressions used by lovers do not amount to the love MO
people feel. The written rules of organization or their means of verbal enactment are not
identical to the actions of the organization itself.
There is always a difference between a history occurring and its linguistic facilitation.
No speech-act is rhe act itself which it helps to prepare, trigger and carry our. One must
admit, to be sure, that a word often produces irrevocable consequences; one thinks of Hit-
ler's order to invade Poland, to name one flagrant example. Bur it is precisely here that the
relationship becomes cleat. A history does not occur without speech, but it is never identi-
cal to speech and cannot be reduced to it.
For this reason there must be additional preparatory work and a means of enactment be-
yond spoken language which make events possible. Here one might mention, for example,
the trans-linguistic field of semiotics. One thinks of bodily gestures, in which language is
communicated only in encoded form, of magical rites extending to the theology of the sac-
rifice, which is historically located not in the word but in the cross, of group behaviours es-
tablished by virtue of their symbols, or of modern traffic signs: each of these cases repre-
sents a sign language comprehensible without words. An of the signals mentioned here can
be verbalized. They are also reducible to language, but their achievement rests precisely in
the fact that spoken language must be abandoned in order to trigger or control relevant
acts, attitudes or behaviors.
26 HISTURY Of COr-;CEPTS
Let us recall some further extra-linguistic preconditions for possible histories: spatial
proximity or distance, distances that, according to circumstances, may foster or delay con-
flicts; the temporal differences between the age-groups in a generational unit, or the bipo-
larity of the sexes. All of these differences involve events, conflict and reconciliation, which
are facilitated pre-Iinguistically, even if they can, but do not necessarily, occur by virtue of
linguistic articulation.
There are thus extra-linguistic, pre-linguistic (and post-linguistic) elements in all acts
that lead to a history. They are closely attached to the elemental, geographical, biological
and zoological conditions, all of which affect occurrences in society by way of the human
constitution. Birth, love, death, food, hunger, misery and disease, perhaps also happiness,
in any case abduction, victory, killing and defeat: all of these are also elements or: and
means of enactment in, human history - extending from everyday life to the identification
of patterns of political rule - whose extra-linguistic premises are difficult to deny.
The analytical divisions made here ate, to be sure, scarcely conceivable within the con-
crete context of event-producing acts. People acquire all pre-linguisric notions linguistically
and convey them in concrete speech with their conduct and sufferings. While the event is
going on, spoken language or read writing, effective - or ignored - speech become interwo-
ven with an event which is always composed of linguistic and extra-linguistic elements of
activity. Even when speech falls silent, linguistic fore-knowledge which is inherent in hu-
man beings and enables them to communicate with their fellows, whether about other hu-
man beings, things, products, plants or animals, remains.
The more highly aggregated human units of action are, for example, in modern work
processes with their economic interconnections or in the increasingly complex political are-
nas of action, the more important the conditions of linguistic communication become in
order to preserve the capacity to act. One could demonstrate this for the expansion of lin-
guistic mediation: from the audible range of a voice to technical communications provid-
ers, from writing, printing, the telephone, and radio down to a television or computer
screen - including all of the institutions of transportation technology, from messengers,
postal service and press to information satellites - and including the radical consequences
for any linguistic codification. What is at stake here is always either lending permanence to
the range of the spoken language in order to capture events, or extending and accelerating
it's reach in order to anticipate, trigger or control events. This reference may suffice to dem-
onstrate the interrelatedness of all 'social history' and 'linguistic history' in a given enact-
ment of speaking and doing.
Spoken language or each read text and the event occurring at anyone time cannot be
separated in actu. but only analytically. Someone who is overwhelmed by a speech experi-
ences this not only linguistically but also in his or her whole body, and someone who is
'struck dumb' by an act experiences all the more his or her dependence upon language in
order [0 regain movement. This personal correlation between speech and act may be ap-
plied to all levels of the increasingly complex social units of action. The demonsnared in-
teractions between so-called speech-acts and 'actual' occurrences range from individual
speaking and acting to their multiple social interactions, by virtue of which events appear
in their connections. This finding, which despite all historical variations constitutes every
SOCIAL IIIS"!'ORYAND BEGRIFFSGESCHICHTF. 27
oeeuring history (geschehende Geschichre), has substantial consequences for the portrayal of
past histories, particularly for the difference between social history and Begriffigeschichte.
History Portrayed (dargestellte Geschichte) and its Linguistic Sources
The empirical connection between acting and speaking presented thus far is exploded as
soon as we rum our gaze from history oceuring in eventu ro the past history with which
professional historians concern themselves - ex eventu. The analytical separation between
an extra-linguistic and a linguistic plane of action assumes the status of an anthropological
given, without which no historical experience could ever be transferred into everyday or
scholarly statements. For whatever happens beyond my own experience, 1 experience only
through speech or writing. Even if language - at least for a rime - may be but a secondary
factor in the performance of acring and suffering, as soon as an event becomes parr of the
past, language is promoted to the status of a primary factor, without which no memory and
no scholarly transposition of memory is possible. The anthropological primacy oflanguage
for the representation of history as it has happened thereby takes on an epistemological sra-
rus since we need language in order to decide what in past history was linguistically deter-
mined, and what was not.
Anthropologically speaking, every 'history' is formed by rhe oral and written communi-
cation of generations living rogerher and conveying their respective experiences to each
orher. Only when the old generations die out and the orally transmitted space of memory
shrinks does writing become the primary bearer of historical transmission. There are, to be
sure, numerous extra-linguistic remains that bear witness ro past events and circumstances:
rubble that bears witness to catastrophes, coins to economic organization, buildings to
community, governance and services, roads to trade or war, cultural landscapes ro the labor
of generations, monuments to victory or death, weapons ro battle, rools to inventions and
applications, and 'relics' or 'discoveries' - or images - that may bear witness to all of these
things at once. All of these materials are processed by special hisrorical disciplines. "What
'actually' happened, though, is something rhat, all our hypotheses notwithstanding, only
oral and written, that is linguistic, testimony can tell us for sure. It is at the linguistic
sources that the road forks, dividing what happened in the past into the 'linguistic' and the
'actual'. Viewed from this standpoint, one may redefine the relationships between the disci-
plines and their further elaborarions.
What belonged together while the event was occurring can only be determined after the
fact by using linguistic testimonies, and, depending upon how one treats this linguistic in-
heritance, this oral or written tradition, the most diverse genres may come together while
others split apart.
It is a characteristic of myths and fairy tales, the drama, the epic and the novel that all
presuppose and address the original connection between word and deed, suffering, speech
and silence. It is only this recalling of occuring hisrory (geschehende Geschichte) that pro-
duces the meaning which remains worth remembering. And this is precisely the achieve-
ment of all those histories that make use of true or fictional speech in order to do justice to
28 I IISTORYOF CONCEPTS
events that are worth remembering, or that recall those words congealed into writing that
bear witness to the amalgamation of speech and act.
It is the unique situations which bring forth their own transformation, and behind
which something like 'destiny' may shine through, the study and passing down of which
continues to challenge our every interpretation of self and the world. This genre includes,
more or less neatly, all memoirs and biographies which, often bearing the tide 'Life and
Letters', emphasize the interactions between language and life, as well as all histories which
follow events in their immanent dynamism. 'He said this and did that, she said such and
such and did such and such, this led to something astonishing, something new, which
changed everything' - numerous works are constructed according to this formalized pat-
tern, particularly those, such as hisrories of political events or diplomacy, with access to
sources that allow them to construct occurrences in actu. Viewed from the perspective of
rheir linguistic achievements, these histories take their place in a long line that extends
from mythology ro the novel." Only in their scholarly status do they feed on the - verifiable
- authenticity of their linguistic sources which now must vouch for the link between lin-
guistic acts and deeds that formerly went without saying.
That which can be separated analytically - the pre-Iinguistic and the linguistic - is
brought together again in a manner 'analogous to experience' thanks to linguistic perform-
ance: it is the fiction of the factual. For what actually occurred is - in retrospect - real only
in the medium of linguistic fiction. Language, in contrast to active speech in the history in
progress, thus acquires an epistemological primacy which always compels it to reach a ver-
dict about the relationship between language and conduct.
Now, there are genres which, when confronted with this alternative, articulate them-
selves in an extremely one-sided manner. There are, for example, annals which record only
results - what happened, but never how it happened. There an: handbooks and works of
so-called narrative history which treat deeds and their success or failure, bur never the
words or speeches that led to them. The actors may be great men, or highly stylized active
subjects who take action wordlessly, so to speak; states or dynasties, churches or sects,
classes or parties or whatever other agents are being hypostatized. Rarely, however, does
anyone inquire into the linguistic patterns of identification without which such agents
could not act at all. Even where the spoken word or its written equivalents are incorporated
into the portrayal, the linguistic evidence is all too easily suspected of ideology, or read only
insrrumenrally in order to get at supposedly preexisting interests and evil intentions.
Even those studies undertaken from the perspective of linguistic history, which - on the
other end of our scale - primarily address the linguistic evidence itself, easilyfall prey to the
temptation to apply it to a real history, which must itself first be constructed linguistically.
The methodological difficulties inherent in relating speaking and language to social condi-
tions and changes, a thought particularly challenging for sociolinguistics remain closely al-
lied to the problem shared by all historians, the need to first construct with language the
very field of which they ate about to speak.
For this reason we also encounter the other extreme in our profession: the editing of the
linguistic sources as such, the written remains of formerly spoken or written speech. In this
case, the point at which the difference between extra-linguistic and linguistic acts is ad-
SOlJAI. rusroav AND BECRIFFSGESCHIClITE 29
dressed in its own right is left to the accident of which records have survived. It is always
the task of correct commentary to track down the meaning of written evidence, which can-
not be found at all without a definition of the difference between speech and the facts.
In the above remarks we have depicted three genres which, given the alternative of lin-
guistic act and deed, either relate the two to each other or, in the extreme case, address
them separately. Episremologically speaking, language always has a dual task. It refers both
to the extra-linguistic context of occurrences and - in the act of doing so ~ to itself. It is,
viewed historically, always self-reflexive.
Event and Structure - Speech and Language
Whilst we have only discussed history occurring and history occurred (geschehende
Geschichte and geschehene Gesc!Jic!Jte) and asked how, III each case, in actu, so to speak in a
synchronic cross-section, speech and deed related to each other, the question expands as
soon as diachrony is brought into the picture. Similar to the relationship between speaking
and acting, here, too, synchrony and diachrony cannot be empirically separated in the en-
actment of the event. The conditions and determinants which teach, temporally sharply
graded, from the so-called past into the present, intervene in the occurrence in question
just as the agents act 'simultaneously' from their various models of the future. All syn-
chrony is, ipso[acto. simultaneously diachronic. In actu; temporal dimensions are always in-
terconnected, and to define the so-called present as, for example, one of those moments
that insert themselves from the past into the future - or which, conversely, slip from the fu-
ture into the past as elusive points of transition, would be to contradict all experience.
Theoretically, one could define all history as a permanent present containing the past and
the future - or, alternatively, as the continuing interaction between past and future, which
constantly causes the present to disappear. In the one case, which is exaggerated in syn-
chrony, history deteriorates into a pure space of consciousness in which all temporal di-
mensions are contained simultaneously, while in the other which is exaggerated in
diachrony the active p r ~ n of human beings would, historically, have no scope of action.
This thought-experiment is only intended to point out that the differentiation, introduced
by Saussure, between the synchronic and the diachronic can be analytically helpful
throughout and yet incapable of doing justice to the temporal interlockings in history as
they take place.
It is with this reservation that we use the analytical categories of synchrony which is di-
rected at the current presenmess of an occurrence in a given case, and diachrony, which is
directed at the dimension of temporal depth also contained in every current occurrence.
After all, many conditions affect history in the course of its enactment in the long- or mid-
dle-term - as well, of course, as the short-term. They limit the alternatives for action by fa-
cilitating or releasing only certain alternatives.
It is a characteristic of social history and Begriffigeschichte that both, if in different ways,
theoretically presuppose JUSt this connection. It is the connection which is investigated his-
torically between synchronic events and diachronic structures. Moreover, it is the analo-
30 ntxronv OF CONO:I"J'S
gous connection between the spoken word in a specific, synchronic, case and the ever-
present diachronically pre-existing language which Begriffigeschichte addresses. What occurs
in each case may be unique and new, but itis never so new that social conditions, which
were present for a longer period, did not facilitate each unique event. A new term may be
coined which expresses III language previously non-existent experiences or expectations. It
cannot be so new, however, that it was not already virtually contained in the respective ex-
isting language and that it does not draw its meaning from the linguistic context handed
down to it. Thus, both scholarly approaches expand the interplay of speaking and doing in
which an event occurs to include its - variously defined - diachronic dimensions, wirhouc
which a history is neither possible nor comprehensible.
Let us clarify this point with a series of examples. Marriage is an institution that, despite
its pre-linguistic biological implications, teptesents a cultural phenomenon which has ex-
isted, in numerous versions, throughout human history. Because it is a form of association
between two or more persons of different sexes, marriage belongs among the genuine topics
of social-historical research. At the same time, it is obvious that we can only speak of it
from the perspective of social history if written documents are available to inform us about
how different kinds of marriage embodied the concept in a given case.
One might construct two methodological approaches, which will be expressed here in
the condensed form of models. One is directed primarily to events, actions in speech, wrir-
ing and deed, the other primarily at diachronic conditions and the changes in them over
long periods of time. The latter thus looks for social structures and their linguistic equiva-
lents.
1. Thus we may address an individual event, for example a princely marriage, about which
dynastic sources offer ample information: what political motives were at stake, what con-
tractual conditions were set, what dowry was negotiated, how were the ceremonies staged,
and the like. The course of the marriage, with its sequence of events, can also be
sequenuaily reconstructed and recounted, down to the terrible consequences that ensued
when, for example, a war of succession followed a contractually expected inheritance upon
the death of a panner. Nowadays, we are also in a position to reconstruct the analogous his-
tory of a concrete marriage between people from the lower social classes; a fascinating topic
in the history of everyday life which uses many previously untapped sources. In each case
we are dealing with unique individual histories with their own particular unsurmountable
tension between good fortune and misery. and in each case they remain embedded in their
religious, social and political contexts.
2. Social history and Begriffigeschlchte cannot exist without such individual cases, but such
study is not their primary interest. To characterize the second methodological approach,
both aim - again a condensed model - at the long-term conditions, effective across time,
which made the given individual cases possible, and they enquire after the long-term proc-
esseswhich may be derived from the sum of individual cases. Put another way, they enquire
afrer the structures and their transformation, the linguistic premises under which such
structures entered the social consciousness, were understood and also changed.
Let us first follow a specificallysocial historical procedure and then proceed ro one from
Begriffigeschichte.
SOClAL HISTORY AND BI'CRIFFSGESCHICHTE 31
The synchrony of individual marriages and the words or letters exchanged within them
is not excluded from the social-historical gaze. It is, rather, diachronically enveloped. Thus,
for example, the number of marriages is starisrically processed using a social-historical ap-
proach in order to demonstrate the rise in the population by social class. At what point did
the number of marriages exceed the number of households and farms of corporately organ-
ized society, which delimited their circumscribed economic space? How did rhe number of
marriages relate to the corresponding wage and price curves, good or poor harvests, in or-
der to weigh against each other the economic and natural factors for the reproduction of
the population? How can the numbers of legitimate and illegitimate births be related to
each other in order to measure situations of social conflict? What was the relationship be-
tween numbers of births and deaths, of children, mothers and fathers in order to explain
the long-term changes in 'typical' married life? What was the shape of the divorce curve,
which also allows us to draw conclusions about typologies of marriage? All of these almost
randomly chosen questions have one thing in common: they help us to construct 'actual'
processes of a long-term nature, which are not contained as such in the sources.
Tedious preparatory work is required in order to render the sources comparable, to ag-
gregate sequences of numbers. Finally, we need to undertake systematic reflections before-
hand in order to be able to interpret the aggregated series of data. The qualititative evidence
from the sources is never sufficient to allow us directly to derive long-term structural state-
ments from them. The sum of concrete individual cases which occur and are verified
synchronically is in itself silent and cannot 'verify' long- or medium-term - at any rate dia-
chronic - structures. If we are to glean lasting evidence from past history, we thus need
theoretical groundwork: the use of specialized scholarly terminology which alone can sniff
out the connections and interconnections which a given affected individual could not pos-
sibly be aware of at the time.
From the standpoint of social hisrory, whar 'actually' - and not just linguistically - hap-
pened remains, in the long run, a scholarly construction whose evidence depends upon
how convincing the underlying theory is. To be sure, any theoretically based statement is
subject to a methodological verification of the sources, in order to make a claim fat past ac-
tuality, bur the real character of long-term factors often cannot be sufficiently demon-
strated using the individual sources as such. For this reason we could, for example, follow-
ing Max Weber, create ideal types, which combine various criteria for the description of re-
ality in such a way that the presumed connections become consistently interpretable. Thus
- to draw on our series of examples - we might elaborate the types of peasant and 'sub-
peasant' (unterbduerlich) marriage and families, which in each case would incorporate the
average number of births and deaths, the correlation to wage and price series or to the se-
quence of poor harvests, to working hours and tax burdens, in order to find out what dis-
tinguishes a peasam from a 'sub-peasant' marriage and family, and how both changed in
the transition from the pre-iudustrial to the industrial era.
The factors of individual cases, not the cases themselves, may then be structured in such
a way that the economic, political and natural preconditions - depending upon the impor-
tance of the wage-price structure, tax burden or harvest yields - become comprehensible
for a stratum-typical marriage. The question of which factors remain similar for how long,
32 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
when are they dominant and when recessive, then allows us to define periods or epochal
rhreshholds into which the history of peasant and 'sub-peasant' marriages may be divided
diachronically.
Up until now, our series of examples has been consciously chosen for those bundles of
factors that allow primarily extra-linguistic series of events m be structured diachronically
and related m each other. Setting it up presupposes a social-historical theory which allows
us, using specialist terminology (here that of demography, political economy and public fi-
nance), m define duration and transformations, which can never be found in the sources as
such. The claims made by theory thus grow in proportion to the distance to the 'self-re-
potting' of the sources that we must maintain in order to construct long time periods or
typical societal forms.
Naturally, however, quite other bundles of factors than those already mentioned are also
included in the history of those marriages to be posited as 'typical'. The factors in question
here cannot he investigated at all without an interpretation of their linguistic self-articula-
tion. And here we come to the procedure required by Begriffigeschichte which - analogous
m the distinction between event and structure - must distinguish between current speech
and its linguistic premises.
Theology, religion, law, morality and custom set the framework for each concrere mar-
riage, which precedes the individual case diachronically and generally outlasts it. Taken as a
whole, these are institutionalized rules and patrerns of interpretation which set up and de-
limit the living space for a given marriage. To be sure, these also determine 'extra-linguistic'
patterns of behaviot, but language remains the primary mediating instance in all of the
cases mentioned.
The linguistically articulated premises, without which (if to a diminishing degree) a
marriage can be neither contracted nor conducted, range from customs and legal acts to
sermons, from magic and the sacraments to metaphysics. We must thus study the types of
texts, with their diverse social classifications, in which the marriages were variously defined.
These may be texts that arose spontaneously (e.g.. diaries, letters or newspaper reports) or,
at the other end of the spectrum, those formulated with normative intent (e.g., theological
treatises or legal codifications complete with commentaries). Traditions tied to language,
which diachronically fix a potential marriage's sphere of life, are at work in all of these
cases. And if changes do emerge, it is only when marriage has been subjected to a new defi-
nition.
Thus the theological interpretation of marriage as an indissoluble institution ordained
by God with the chief purpose of preserving and propagating the human race remained
dominant well into the eighteenth century. The stipulations within traditional corporative
law (StandeSfecht) that a marriage was permissable only if the economic foundation of a
household was sufficient to support and raise the children and to secure the spouses' mu-
tual assistance were consistent with this view. Thus, numerous people were legally excluded
from the opportunity of contracting a marriage. As the nucleus of the household, marriage
remained integrated within corporate society. This changed in the wake of the Enlighten-
ment, which defined a new contractual basis for marriage in the [Prussian] General Legal
Code (Allgemeines Landrecht). The economic tie was loosened and the spouses' freedom as
SOCIAL HISTORY AND 33
individuals was expanded to the extent that divorce - theologically forbidden - was made
legal. The General Legal Code by no means abandoned theological and corporate defini-
tions, bur the concept of marriage shifted several degrees in the direction of greater free-
dom and self-determination for both partners - a shift which only conceptual history al-
lows us to register.
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, we encounter a wholly new concept of mar-
riage. The theological justification was replaced by an anthropological self-justification, the
institution of marriage stripped of its legal framework to make way for the moral self-reali-
zation of two persons who love each other. The 1820 Brockhaus Encyclopedia celebrates
this postulated autonomy in emphatic phrases, coining the innovative term 'love-marriage'
(Liebesehe). Here marriage has lost its former primary aim of producing children; economic
considerations have been left of the picture and Blumschli later went so far as to declare a
marriage without love to be immoral. Such marriages were to be annulled."
We have now sketched three stages within Begri./figeschichte, each of which structured
the traditional normative stock of arguments differently and, in important respects,
innovatively. From the perspective of linguistic history, the development of concepts within
the new legal code and Romantic liberalism assumed the character of events. They then
had repercussions for the entire linguistic structure within which marriages could be un-
derstood. It was not the diachronically given language as a whole that had changed, but
rather its semantics and the new linguistic practices released thereby.
The methods of Begriffigeschichte by no means allow us to deduce that the history of ac-
tual marriages proceeded along the lines of this linguistic self-interpretation. The economic
constraints described in the social historical overview remained in force, restricting, com-
plicating and burdening marriages. Even when legal barriers were lowered, social pressures
remained effective in ensuring that the typology of the love match did not become the only
empirical norm. To be sure, there is much to be said for the hypothesis that the notion of
the love-match, once developed, so to speak in temporal anticipation, found increased
chances of realization in the long term. Conversely, it is undeniable that even before the
Romantic conceptualization of the low-match, love as an anthropological given also found
a place in those marriages contracted under corporative lawwhich do not mention it at all.
The conclusion to be drawn for the relationship between social history and
Begriffigeschichte is that they need and depend on each other, but can never be made con-
gruent. What 'actually' became effective in the long term and what changed cannot be de-
duced wholly from the written evidence that has come down to us. For this we first need
theoretical and terminological groundwork. 'X'hat, on rhe other hand, can be demon-
strated using Begriffsgeschichte - on the basis of the written evidence - refers us, to be sure,
to the Iinguisrically delimited space of experience; it documents innovative ventures which
may have recorded or initiated new experiences. However, this still does not permit us to
make assumptions about an actual history. The difference between action and speech
which we have demonstrated for history III the process of occurring prevents social 'reality'
from ever converging with the history of its linguistic articulation, even in retrospect. Even
if, in a synchronic cross-section - itself an abstraction - speech and acts remain inter-
twined, diachronic change - which remains a theoretical construct - does not proceed (in
34 )IISTORY OF (JlNCFI")S
terms of 'real history' and Begri}figeJchfchte) in the same temporal rhythms or sequences.
Reality may have long since changed before the transformation was ever given a name, and
likewise, concepts may have been formed that released new realities.
Yet an analogy exists between social history and Begri}figeJchfchte which remains to be
pointed out in conclusion. What happens in each case uniquely in occurring history is only
possible because the assumed preconditions repeat themselves with a long-term regularity.
Subjectively, the act of marrying may be unique, but it also articulates repeatable struc-
tures. The economic preconditions for a marriage, which depended upon the results ofhar-
vests that fluctuated annually or on conjunctures that changed over loug periods or on tax
burdens which bled the planned household monthly or yearly (not to speak of the peasant
population's regular services) are only effective because they were repeated regularly with
more or less constancy. The same holds true for the social implications of a marriage which
can only be specifically grasped linguistically. The givens of custom, the legal framework
and - perhaps still- theological interpretation; all of these institutional ties are only effec-
tive in actu in that they are repeated from case to case. And if they change, it is only slowly,
without any damage to their iterated structures. What is known as the 'longue duree' is his-
torically effective only in that rhe unique rime of events contains repeatable structures
whose velocities of change differ from those of the events themselves. In this interaction,
which is defined only inadequately by 'synchrony' and 'diachrony", lies encapsulated the
subject of all social history.
The interaction between current speech in any given case and pre-existing language
should be defined analogously, but not identically. When a term, such as 'marriage' is used,
it stores in language experiences of marriage with long-term effects which have established
themselves in the concept. Furthermore, the pre-existing linguistic context regulates the
range of its meaning. Each time the word 'marriage' is used, the linguistic premises which
structure its meaning and understanding are repeated. Here too, it is iterated linguistic
structures that both release and limit speech's scope of action. Each conceptual alteration
that becomes a linguistic event occurs in the act of semantic and pragmatic innovation,
which allows us to grasp the old differently and the new in the first place.
Social history and Begriffignchichte have differing velocities of change and are grounded
in distinct structures of repetition. For this reason, the scholarly terminology of social his-
tory depends on the history of concepts to help it verify linguistically stored experience.
And for this reason, the history of concepts remains dependent upon the findings of social
history, in order to keep Il1 view the gap between vanished reality and its linguistic evi-
dence, a gap chat remains forever unbridgeable.
socur. HISTORY ANI) 11E(;RII-TS(;FSCHICHl'E 35
CHAPTER 3
Speech Acts, Languages or Conceptual
History?
JAIl\: HAMPSHER-MONK
This chapter discusses the work of the two most prominent names in Anglophone history
of political thought, and offers some comparison between their work and the project of
Begriffigeschichte as approaches to the history of political concepts broadly conceived;'
J.G.A. Pocock and Quentin Skinner both studied at the University of Cambridge where
Skinner is now Regius Professor of History. Pocock has held permanent POStS at Canter-
bury University in New Zealand, at Washington University, St. Louis and at ]ohns
Hopkins University, Baltimore, where he is now professor emeritus. Each has published
major methodological and substantive historical work of their own, but each has also initi-
ated and directed major collaborative works which, whilst not as minutely concerted as the
German Lexikons, certainly bear comparison with them in terms of scope and ambition.
Together, as I hope to show, they represent a competing programme of how to understand
historical changes in social and political concepts.'
Quentin Skinner has been a moving force in two major publishing initiatives under-
taken by Cambridge University Press which have come to dominate anglophone scholar-
ship in this field. The first of these was the 'Ideas in Context' research monograph series
which now has some thirry titles in print. The declared aim of the series was to present
studies of the development of new 'procedures aims and vocabularies' within the then exist-
ing intellectual context. It expressed the hope that such an approach would dissolve
'artifical distinctions between the history of philosophy, of various sciences, or society and
politics, and of literature'.' The second publishing venture promoted by Skinner has been
the publication of a massive tange of cheap yet high-quality editions of original works of
political theory, many of which were unavailable in modern editions, or indeed, in many li-
braries, at all. The 'Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought' now comprises
some 83 titles, and reflects, as [he series description claims, the needs of modern scholar-
ship for access to less well-known texts in order to make sense of the major. Although Skin-
ner has not hitherto been involved in systematically collaborative research work, he is now
chair of the co-ordinating committee of the European Science Foundation Network on
Early Modern European Republicanism which will, under his edirorship, produce a major
internationally collaborative publication.
SPEECH ACTS, LAMjUAl.;I:S OR CONCEI'TU."L HISTORY' 37
It is in this collaborative field that Pocock has excelled, He chaired the steering commit-
tee of the Cenrer for the Study of British Political Thought, established at the Folger Li-
brary in Washington in 1984. An original series of six huge seminars covering Brirish Po-
litical thought from [he end of the Wars of the Roses to the American War of Independence
('From Boswonh to Yorktown'] ran from 1984-1987. This involved scholars from all over
the world and was later supplemented by further seminars, recapitulating certain periods
and extending the historical range down to the period of the French Revolution. The
Folger seminar series produced an impressive five-volume Proceedings and a fertile synoptic
volume of essays by the conveners of the individual seminars, as well as a number of works
relating to their own historical periods or interests."
Unlike the editors of Begriffigeschichte, neither Pocock nor Skinner attempted to impose
uniformity of sources, treatment or structure on their contributors whose work characteris-
rically comprised the free standing academic essay or monograph. Nevertheless there is a
shared intellectual approach and sense of common enterprise in both sets of work which,
together which the sheer scale of the enterprises, makes comparison with the great collabo-
rative German enterprises not inappropriate.'
Since other conrriburors make reference to the context within which Begriffigeschichte
arose and the positions it was opposed to, it might help also to make some prefaratory re-
marks abour rhe Anglophone context in which the 'historical revolution' arose and with
which Skinner and Pocock's work has become identified." For the academic audience that
both Skinner and Pocock addressed at the start of their careers were 'political theorists'
practitioners who, whilst they often studied political theorists of the past, did not do so in a
self-consciously historical fashion.' Whilst such historical work had been conducted in
British and American history departments (often by European emigres) it was rarely central
to Anglophone historiography. 'Political theory', however, was a subject taught in
English-speaking universities across a range of departments - political science and philoso-
phy as well as history. In the academic study ofpolincal theory', critical attention was paid
to a wide variety of texts produced under a huge range of historical circumstances from an-
cient Greece to industrial modernity. Such study could assume that the object of the au-
thors of all these had been to provide some (often comprehensive) and certainly enduring
philosophical account of political concepts and it was commonly conducted - particularly
outside history departments - as though all these authors were alive and well, and working
just down the corridor. Although in philosophy and political science departments it was
common to separate 'political theory' into the study of a chronological sequence of 'au-
thors' on the one hand, and an a-temporal study of 'concepts' on the other, no disciplinary
distinction was commonly made in approaching these two exercises. Just as the history of
philosophy, for twentieth-century anglophone philosophers has often been a training
ground, a repertoire of problems and arguments, a jumping-off point for the practice of
philosophy and not an historical subject matter in its own righr:" so political theorists too,
- working to philosophical criteria of coherence, consistency, comprehensiveness, as well as
considerations of perceived political relevance - sought to use past theorists, just as much
as a-historical conceptual analysis, as a basis for their own theorising activity.'!
38 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
Exhilerating as such a philosophical treatment was, it was often outrageously
unhisrorical in two important senses. Firsdy, in the synchronic dimension, the critical em-
phasis meant that in approaching any individual thinker insufficient attention was com-
monly given to recovering the intended meanings (or indeed the agenda) of the texts as
written. This was particularly exacerbated by a prevailing Cold-War manichaeism which
deemed it imperative to assign to authors (for whom such terms could have had no mean-
ing) championship, or even responsibility for the emergence of the then prevailing rotali-
tartan and liberal ideologies. Thus writers as diverse as Marsilius ofPadua and Hobbes were
identified as articulating the foundation of liberalism, whilst Plato and Rousseau were held
to be advocates of totalitarianism, or at least of those patterns of thought, whose logical
outcome was the camps of Auschwitz and the Culag."
Writers were commonly criticised for failing to address certain problems or concepts, as
though, if they were competent political theorists, they ought to have known that such
'eternal problems' ought to have been addressed.
Skinner's path-breaking article 'Meaning and Understanding' mercilessly exposed the
various mythologies generated by such a-historical expecnons." The mythology of 'doc-
trine' - by which expectations that a certain subject matter had to be addressed lead com-
mentators to construct a position to be ascribed to writers, or to criticise writers for 'failing'
to have addressed it. The mythology of 'coherence' - by which writers were presumed to
have aspired to present dosed and coherent systems which it was the task of the exegete to
reveal, lead to a failure to countenance the possibility that the author in question may - as a
matter of historical fact - have contradicted themselves, changed their minds, ot failed to
notice some tension or contradiction in their thought. In the mythology of 'prolepsis', the
meaning Ot significance a work could have had for its author, is conflared with that subse-
quently ascribed to it by present-day commentators. In the myth of parochialism, the com-
mentator, faced with some truly alien thought-world or conceptual framework, construes it
as one that is familiar and meets their expectations."
The second important sense in which 'political theory' was not historical - even when ir
did treat texts in an historical sequence as 'the history of political thought' - concerned the
diachronic dimension. A sequential canon of texts selected for philosophical interest,
tended both to obscure important historical connections (where hist(}rical!;, important
works were missing from the canon),':' and to foster the ascription of historical connections
between canonical texts where none were in fact present."
It was the recognition of these two important deficiencies that largely fuelled, from the
late Sixties, an 'historical revolution' in the Anglophone study of political theory, and with
which the names ofJ.G.A. Pocock and Quentin Skinnet are rightly associated." They thus
shared with Begriffigeschichte at least two major aims, namely that of recovering - from
Lovejoyan rrans-hisrorical ideas in the case of English, from Historicism in Germany - the
meanings which historical actors and writers brought to their activity; and secondly that of
looking beyond the 'great texts' to a wider usage in order to recover histories of meanings.
Beyond this agreement - important as rt was - however, lay deep divergencies which we
will turn to after the positions of the two anglophone writers are outlined.
SPFECH ACI';. [A;-.JCl!ACES on COt\CEPTUAl. HISTORY? .39
John Pocock andPolitical Languages
Pococks offensive against un-hisrorical political theory started from an attempr ro clarify
what a genuine history of political thought might be, and to distinguish the sequence of
philosophical meditations on historically unsituated texts that often passed for it,l(' from
the genuine attempt to identify historical meaning and the detailed shifts and changes that
actually took place in it. Using the metaphor of topography also favoured by Lovejoy,
Koselleck and Rolf Rcichardt, he claimed that what had passed for the history of political
thought had involved a progression from one mountain top of abstraction to another
(Gratius to Hobbes to Locke, say), assuming that the shape of the connecting ridges in be-
tween could be deduced from the disposition of the peaks. By contrast, the true historian
must empirically investigate rhese contours to ensure whether the peaks were indeed re-
lated to one another in the ways claimed. le
To continue the analogy, the medium for this landscape or topography was identified
with a linguistic repertoire which might include very abstract and high-level works as well
as relativelyspecific and mundane ones. His claim was that, at least in stable societies, rela-
tively discrete vocabularies of politics comprised concepts grouped together in an internally
ordered domain wirh a grammar and syntax, even a literature and repertoire of associations
lropoi event), which mimicked that discoverable in a naturallanguage;" Often, particularly
in early modernity, such languages were deployed by distinct occupational or status-groups
which re-enforced sociologically the discrete character of the language. I'!
Pocock's recent remark that 'the history of political thought has been becoming all my
life less a history of thought than of language, literature':" is borh a truth of his personal in-
tellectual biography and of the determinedly linguistic character of anglophone philosophy
in the last fony years. Since we cannot identify thoughts except as they are articulated, the
history of political thought must collapse into the history of their articulations. The postu-
lation of thoughts as entities distinct from the articulations of them parallels the postula-
tion of noumena as distinct from phenomena, and is vulnerable to the same criticisms.
The work done by the concept of language in Pococks thinking - with a shaft detour via
the paradigm" - has accordingly increased over time, acquiring a Suassurian vocabulary to
distinguish not only the diachronic from the synchronic dimensions, but the characteriza-
tion of the language (la langue) as a whole from the particular performances (leparole) un-
dertaken in it.!l
Pocock saw the primary interpretive task of the historian as that of identifying and re-
constructing the languages in which politics had been discussed and their mutation over
time. The most famous example is the recovery of the language of civic humanism in early
modern Britain. But language could also perform an explanatory role with regard to an in-
dividual thinker's thought which could be understood by identifying its relationship with
the language - or languages - being deployed by the writer. For example, Edmund Burke's
peculiar conception of reason could be illuminated by reconstructing the common-law lan-
guage and associations from which it derived." Explanation was thus a two-way,
[anus-Faced enterprise, in which either the iangue or the parolecould be used to explain the
other. A langue, and indeed its history, could be reconstructed from reading a variety of the
40 HISTURY UF CONe!!' I,';
paroles performed in it, and a particular parole could be illuminated by a fuller appreciation
of the lange in which it was couched, or langues it arrempred to combine or synthesize.
Pocock was aware of the potentially trivial character of such explanations, and stressed
the importance of maintaining a distinction between langue and parole. The author's parole
is one performance amongst many possible in any given langue. If the language cannot be
identified independently of the text which exemplifies it, it can exercise no explanatory
power." The investigator must satisfy him- or herself that the language they have identified
was indeed an existent and discrete cultural resource for the writer and 'not merely a gleam
In the historian's interpretive eye.?' At one point, Pocock even identified a series of verifica-
tion criteria to test for the independent existence of a language,
a) different authors carried our a variety of acts within it,
b) they discussed one another's use of it, sometimes giving rise to mere-languages
cl investigators are able to predict the Implications, and intimations, entailed by its use in
particular circumstances
d) they can discover its use in unexpected places
e) they successfully exclude languages from consideration on grounds of non-availability. 2(,
The historian's articulation of a language - or a statement articulated in it - always in-
volved the temptation to render coherent a position which was not, and Pocock was ini-
tially concerned to draw attention to the (for anglophone political theorists) irresistible
temptation to confuse the doing of political theory (the attempt to create a coherent ac-
count of the political world), with the writing of histories of it (the construction of an his-
torically accurate account of such an attempt or attempts). Escaping such pitfalls involved
correctly assessing the level of abstraction at which any given composition was intended to
operate, as well as the extent to which the author intended a reflective or reconstirutive
philosophical activity or a rhetorical exhortation to action." Thinkers at a high level of ab-
straction uncovered and sometimes sought to restructure basic linguistic relationships fairly
self-consciously (one thinks of Hobbes's self-proclaimed intention to 'set before men's eyes
the mutual relation between protection and obedience' and his more covert and subversive
one of defining outward acts and faith in such a mutually exclusive way as to virtually pre-
clude the possibility of conscientious Christian disobedience)." By contrast, less abstract
thinkers' activities could be explained by bringing to the reader's attention relationships be-
tween concepts and patterns of speech now lost which the subject of the study had assumed
rather than made explicit. The major success here was the recovery of Harrington who was
rescued from virtual oblivion and turned into a figure of crucial importance in a range of
discourses concerning the application of republican ideas to England, and eighteenth-cen-
tury understandings of the constitutional implications of the socio-hisrorical changes of the
sixteenth and seventeenth century,
Pocock claimed that the identity of the appropriate local languages and the appropriate
level of abstraction for dealing with a text were historically verifiable questions, not open-
ended or a matter of choice for the investigator. Interpretation was constrained (although
not determined) by objectively identifiable characteristics of the text. To Stanley Fish's
sceptical 'is there a text in the class" Pocock's robust answer was that whatever other practi-
tioners' find, or fail to find, in theirs 'there certainly was a text in the historian's class'."
SI'FI':(:H A( 'IS, on COI'CEPTUAL HlSTORY? 41
Despite I'ocock's commitment to 'present the text as it bore meaning in the mind of the
author or his contemporary reader"? it has been a criticism that his narratives have some-
times operated at a level of abstraction 'far exceeding that attained by the writers he stud-
ied.'!' However his identification of languages as the appropriate rranshistorical units of
study provides him with some justification for doing this. Inasmuch as a language may be
said to comprise a set of relationships -logical and associative- and porenrials. these might
be unrealized by its users, who nevertheless reaniculared and transmitted them and so ren-
dered them available to subsequent users of it." A language can never be reduced to the
propositions actually advanced in it at any one time.
Fertile, powerful, and suggestive as Pocock's methodological reflections are, they seem
essentially subordinate to, or at least ansing out of, and developing through periodic reflec-
tions on his practice." Indeed it is tempting -looking back at The Ancient Constitution and
the Feudal Law - to see Pocock's method as immanent in one of his earliest and recurrent
subject matters; the common law mind and the customary character of even the most theo-
retical performances.
Quentin Skinner and Speech Acts
Quenrin Skinner's earliest works, by contrast, were already self-consciously declaring a very
precise methodological programme resting on the analysis given by John Austin and John
Searle of speech acn." Skinner's strategic focus was synchronic: on the performance of in-
dividual speech acts, rather than Pocock's diachronic concern with language. History was
to be constructed from an analysis of successive significant tnnovatory (or conservative)
speech acts performed by individuals in a given language or, as he sometimes called it ideol-
ogy.
What did the idea of the speech act bring tu this programme? According to speech act
analysis, speaking or writing is not adequately characterized as the production of audible
sounds or graphic shapes, nor yet as words, nor even (usually) as referring (to some state of
the world), or predicating (some property of some thing or person in the world). Language
is nor (usually, or at least not interestingly) used to describe some state of affairs in the
world. Certainly political uses of language are rarely so one-dimensional. Rather, in poli-
tics, speech is used to affiet the world. Political speech is paradigmatically speech action.
The idea of the speech act draws attention to the fact that in speaking or writing we
commonly perform actions, and in the most simple cases the descriptions of these actions
ate cases cognate with the verbs the actor might him or herself use in performing the act.
These were, in Austin's terms 'performative utterances', utterances which at the same time
perform the action referred to.
Thus if I say 'I warn you that I might go on like this for another half an hour' I have, in
that very statement itself performed the act ofwarning. In saying, 'I warn', I do in fact warn
you, I have performed an action in speech, or a speech-acr." In saying, 'I promise not to
stop even if the audience falls asleep.' I perform the act of promising. Such verbs were
'illocutionary"." The fact of using them was sufficient (under certain definable rules) to
successfully perform the action they described."
42 HISTORY OF CO'J( TVI-S
Yet a further class of words described actions, the successful completion of which re-
quired some extrinsic effect to result. I can legitimately claim that in publishing this paper,
I am trying to persuade my readers that all this has something ro do with the study of the
history of political ideas, without fear of refutation, for such is indeed my intention. What
I could not claim, without independent corroboration, was that I was convincing you that
it did. Your being convinced IS not accomplished by my trying to persuade you, but only by
your, in fact, being persuaded. Illocutionary acts characterize the deployment of authorial
intentions in some linguistic performance, warning, advising, exhorting. denouncing, ridi-
culing, exposing ere. Perlocutionaryacts describe intentions which intend to produce and
do indeed bring about some change in the listener's understanding of the situation. Per-
suading, convincing, revolutionizing, de-legitimating (on at least most counts of what it is
to legitimate), include both intention and its successful completion. Of course not all
would-be perlocurionnry acts achieve their intended effect. The distinction, although only
formalised by Austin, was used ro good effect by Shakespeare. In the following exchange he
depicts Harry Hotspur exploiting it ro ridicule Owen Clendower's boorish attempt ro im-
press his fellow conspirators by claiming supernatural powers:
Clendower:
Hotspur:
I can call spirits from the vasty deep
Why, so can I, or so can any man;
But will they come when you do call for them? r
Skinner's claim then was that theorists and writers, no less than actors, do not simply
wrire or say things, but that in writing or saying something they perform some
illocurionary action and often a perlocurionary one as well. To understand any given lin-
guistic performance one had to gtasp its illocurionary force, and to do this one had to fa-
miliarize oneself with the linguistic conventions available to the author. That is to say, one
had to understand what Machiavelli was doing in writing The Prince, or Hobbes in writing
Leviathan. Crucial here was the notion of intention, and its possible relationship to con-
vennoo." I can promise, because I can formulate the intention ro promise, and that inten-
tion is available to me because of the existence of the institution of promising in my lan-
guage, and amongst those ro whom I promise. Promising without the intention - least
controversially in the case of someone who does not know the language and simply utters
the sound - fails to perform the appropriate speech act. Knowingly promising (other things
being equal), commits the promisee to their course of action - she cannot evade the obliga-
tion byclaiming that 'I promise' is only a sound, or 'promising' only a convention.'?
Against borh textualists (who insisted that we simply read the text) and conrexcualists
(who insisted that we use the (social) context to explain its meaning), Skinner urged, not
that we could dispense with either activity, but that recovering the repertoire of socially
given meanings and conventions available ro the actor was a logical prerequisite of two ac-
tivities.
The first one is locating their linguistic performance within the author's contemporary
world of meaning, and so being able to show minimally, what an author might legitimately
be taken to have meantwhen they wrote what they wrote. This suggested a non-trivial prin-
S['FFCH A(['.'. IANCUACES OR CONCEPTL:AJ. HISTORY' 43
ciple of interpretive exclusion: where certain linguistic meanings or conventions are not
available to a writer or speaker, rhey could not possibly be construed as performing them
and their work could not be so understood. Since all meanlllg is social in the sense that the
meanings of a word are to be recovered from its possible uses in a given society oflanguage
users;" the recovery of meanings available to the author was an essential [but by no means
exclusive or sufficient] criterion of scholars' interpretations of the author's own meaning.
Since, at least on this account of meaning, authors could not have framed an intention to
convey a meaning which their existing linguistic resources didn't allow, and any historical
actor whose conception of prevailing linguistic conventions departed too far from that of
his audience, would fail disastrously to bring off his linguistic performance." Interpreta-
tions which presupposed such intentions could successfully be rejected. Thus, Machiavelli's
Prince could not be a satire, Chapter V of Locke's SecondTreatise could not be an apology
for capitalism, and Rousseau's Du Contrat Social could not be a justification for Toralirari-
anism, since none of these categories were available to those authors, and could not have
entered into their intentions in writing rhem.
But the second and crucial task which an understanding of existing conventions permit-
ted us to perform was that of identifying innovation, conflict and subversion when it was
taking place. As Skinner pointed our to those who accused him of being unable to account
for innovation - knowledge of the prevailing meanings and genres was actually a condition
of even recognizing innovations in usage when it was achieved, let alone of giving a success-
ful account of it.
H
The claim was that an understanding of speech-acts - the accomplish-
ment of some social or political performance through linguistic utterance - rested not only
on the identification of conventional meaning, genre and practice, but also and perhaps
more importantly, on rhe identification of departures from rhese." Thus we could only un-
dersrand the Prince properly by understanding the conventional performances thitherto
conducted in that genre (handbooks for princes) and the way in which Machiavelli discon-
certs, subverts, and in various ways departs from the expecrarions normal to that genre."
This analysis involved exploiting the margin which, in any linguistic world, divides, or one
should rather insist, connects, the savable and the unsayable.
It was precisely in this innovative, or at least a-typical, deployment of linguistic conven-
tions that we could understand what an author was doing in writing the way he or she did.
Such accounts are particularly salient it might be added, to the recovery of political mean-
ing since the act of political persuasion most commonly involves the rhetorically innovative
extension or restriction of conventional meanings or repertoires as the author seeks to cap-
ture or deny the commendatory force of the term or to extend or restrict the particular ap-
plication of it under discussion.";
Although the speech act was best introduced and understood by reference to its deploy-
ment in the standard, uncontroversial exemplars - such as promising - with which Skinner
lucidly illustrated his accounts, its deployment in understanding the history of political
ideas was primarily in assisting analysis of the ways in which (innovatory] speech acts de-
parted from these conventions.t'' There are thus two levels at which speech action can be
identified - the conventional, and the subversive, which is of course parasitic on the exist-
44 HISrDRY OF CO;..JCEPTS
ence of the conventional, and which is of course itself then liable itself to become conven-
tional.
One classicexample of such a political speech act seeking to subvert conventional mean-
ings for political purposes occurred in the ratification debate for the American Constitu-
tion. The period of the American Founding is one which offered great possibilities for all
three forms of analysis discussed in this chapter." One particular strand in that debate con-
cerned the contested meaning of that open-textured term 'Republic'. During the course of
the War of Independence 'republic' had gained increasingly commendatory overtones."
But what exactly - apart from the absence of a monarch - was a republic? Americans were
concerned that conventional political wisdom of the time - epitomized in Monresquieu -
stressed that republics had to be small. The anti-federalist opponents of the new Constitu-
tion, and indeed Thomas Jefferson himself, increasingly tended to identify a 'republic' with
either a direcr democracy or at least a majorharian and possibly mandated representative
democracy. John Adams, whilst arguing that equality before the law defined a republic,
nevertheless conceded that Democracy was one species of republic. The drift towards iden-
tifying the buzzword 'republic' with direct and or small-scale democracy was seized on by
the anti-federalists, and posed a problem for Madison seeking to enamour his readers with
the new constitutionc- which, it could be objected - consolidated rule at the federal rather
than the state level, and which did so through relatively remote representative bodies. AI;
anti-federalists occasionally protested, such an elected ruling class of the better sort was
conventionally understood as a form of aristocracy. Madison's 'linguistic move' was to ex-
ploit the still negative connotations of 'disorderly democracy' by claiming that this was
what his opponents wanted. Conceding in this way the relevance of the Aristotelian dassi-
ficarion might have allowed the damaging conclusion that what Madison and the 'Federal-
ist' supported was indeed an aristocracy. But in a complex yet unified linguistic move,
Madison, in persuading his readers that direct 'democracy' was not a kind of republic
(which must be elective) at all but an alternative to it, not only denied his opponents'
claims to be republicans, bur evaded the otherwise almost irresistible implication that what
he was defending must be the alternative - a kind of aristocracy - an elective one. The term
'Aristocracy' he now reserved for what had been bur one species of it - hereditary aristoc-
racy- the commendatory overtones of 'republic' wete captured for what had hitherto been
designated elective aristocracy.
Skinner's insistence that speech act analysis directs our attention not only at the conven-
tionallevel of speech action but to what someone is doing in claiming or arguing what they
do here pays dividends. For we can recognise the complexity, innovation and elegance of
Madison's rhetorical move is that in the (conventional speech act of) persuasively defining
a republic as essentially representative government he, in that very same move, both saddles
his opponents with the much more we equivocal identity of democrats, and precludes his
own party's vulnerability to the charge of aiming to establish an aristocracy."!
Thus Skinner could and did - argue that not only did his method restore the priority
of the true historical meaning of any political theory or argument, and was uniquely capa-
ble of characterizing innovation and by implication historical change and process, but a
SPEECHACTS. IANt;UA(;ES OR (:(lNCFPTUAI. HISTORY' 45
general theoretical understanding was being given of what it was that made them political,
in the sense of seeking to change, for the purposes of recommending action, some conven-
tionally established meaning or application, and that this understanding could only he
gained by situating the speech act in its synchronous context.
Comparisons and Reflections
Some commentators make a virtue of sharply distinguishing between the methodological
foundations of Skinner and Pocock, and indeed at one time they seemed concerned to do
so themselves." However, their two positions can be seen - and I think are now recognized
by themselves - to merely place emphasis on different moments of an essentially unified ac-
count of political language use." Pocock places the emphasis on identifying the language of
political discourse which he has helpfully described as 'a complex structure comprising a
vocabulary, a grammar, a rhetoric, a set of usages, assumptions and implications, existing
together in time and employable by a semi-specific community of language-users for pur-
poses polirical'.": This, as we saw, comprises borh the identity of what is being historically
invesrigared-language is rhe historical subject - and a means of explaining the wrirings or
speech of an individual actor. Skinner's focus is on the single performance of a linguistic ac-
tor, and his criticism of the explanatory power of 'language' was that mere identification of
the language did not tell the historian what [speech] acrions were being performed in ir."
Nevertheless, his claims about rhe embeddedness of use, and hence the importance of con-
text, genre and convention show that an understanding of the individual speech act is logi-
cally dependent on (although not guaranteed by) an understanding of the language in
which it is performed. For example, to understand an English speaker's deployment of the
term 'virtue' in rhe eighteenth century we need to know to what extent they understood
themselves to be invoking (and so intended to invoke in their hearers) civic or puritan lan-
guage or associations. Conversely Pocock's derailed charring of linguistic change proceeds
by identifying what he has only recently started to label, but what is clearly indisringuish-
able from Skinner's account of, the innovarory or defensive speech acts performed by lin-
guistic actors.I, Consequently despite rheir different philosophical starting points and em-
phases, Skinner and Pocock have each had to concern themselves bothwith the diachronic
question of the identity of the language and its conventions over time and with the
synchronic question of the individual locutions performed within it at anyone moment.
As a result Skinner, - who famously once delivered an iconoclastic paper to the Political
Studies Association entitled 'The Unimportance of the Great Texts' -like Pocock, is con-
cerned with empirically identifying and according significance to the lessabstract works of
political theory as well as - indeed as a way of identifying - the more singular and innova-
tive theorists, so as to creare a history of political ideas of a genuinely historical character. I';
Each see the same historical commitment as grounding scepticism about the possibility of
identifying for investigation purposes anything more abstract than the actuallinguistic pat-
terns and arguments which can be found in USf. In characteristic Anglophone empiricist
4(, I !lS"'()I{Y or
fashion they would reject the notion that anyching as abstract as a 'concept' could be a pos-
sible subject of primary historical investigation.
Comparative Remarks
Neither Skinner, nor, until recently, and then only briefly and tentatively, Pocock, have ad-
dressed the Begriffigeschichte enterprise direcdy." This is particularly remarkable since each
of them have addressed problems central ro ir." However, Skinner has been outspoken
(and unrepentant] in his denial that a history of concepts was a possible enterprise." Al-
though a number of writers have devoted occasional essays to a consideration of the genre,
or of comparisons between it and the work of Skinner and Pocock, only Melvin Richter has
engaged in sustained championship of Begriffigeschichte in the anglophone world.?'
I stressed at the start the possibility that Begriffigeschichte and linguistic approaches
might have ultimately different objecc." One way of bringing this out is to note the differ-
ent routes raken in arriving at the approaches.
In Germany, Begriffigeschichte was conceived of as an approach to social history. Keirh
Tribe writes: 'Begriffigeschichte is not intended as an end in itself but rather as a means of
emphasizing the importance of linguistic and semantic analysis as a contribution to the
practice of social and economic history"! It nevertheless shares with rhe anglophone rheo-
nsts tWO concerns
I. the 'critique of a careless transfer to rhe pasr of modern context-determined expressions
(..)[and] the practice of treating ideas as constanrs'i'"
2. establishing instead the 'minimal claim that the social and political conflicts of the past
must be interpreted (..) in terms of the mutually understood, past linguistic usages of
the participating agents.'!''>
Koselleck makes clear that whilst Begriffigeschichte can offer insights into a history, the
subject of which is purely theoretical, this is only a preliminary and that he is concerned
with the relationship between two distinct domains, the linguistic/conceptual and the so-
cial/marerial: 'Begriffigeschichte lays claim to an autonomous sphere which exists in a rela-
tion of mutually engendered tension with social hisrory'.6' And he cautions us that, 'once
this history of concepts is laid bare the autonomy of the discipline must not be allowed to
lead to a diminution of the actual historical marenaliry simply because the latter is ex-
cluded for a specific section of the investigation.' His objection is that this would lead to
the view that nothing could be said to have happened historically that was not conceptual-
ised as such. Koselleck wants to use conceptual history to register 'a tension between con-
cept and marerialiry'." The relationship between these two spheres is elusive, but they ate
presented as possessing distinctive epistemological, if not ontological identities. For him
extra linguistic conditions for historical occurrences include not only 'natural and material
givens', but 'institutions and modes of conduct' .(,(; Hisroriography for him involves essen-
tially twO levels - the recovery of the past as it bore meaning for the actors involved, and
the application of ex-post categories (for example those of modern economics) onto his-
torical material. Begriffigeschichte not only exposes this dichotomy, hut forces us to con-
SPEECH ACTS, ORCO"CU'IUAI. HISTORY' 47
front the resolution of it, and so write an adequate hisrory. It is not, however, itself that ad-
equate history.
By contrast the object of anglophone history of political thought tends to understand
conflicts in the development of political discourse and vocabulary either as an object of his-
torical investigation in its own right, or as constitutive ofpoliticalreality, and not a factor in
or relative to a reality existing independently of it.
h7
Even anglophone writers who write the
history of concepts insist: 'there IS a general temptation (..) to understand conceptual
change as a reflection of political change C.) this temptation must be avoided at all costs'"
The reason for this is that they see political institutions, practices and conflict as consti-
tuted in and through the languages used by, and constructing and restricting the
self-perceptions of, those who hold office, perform or compete politically; moreover politi-
cal action is and can only be understood as linguistic action: commanding, negotiating,
conceding, exhorting, mobilizing, compromising, agreeing and all the other verbs compris-
ing the vocabulary of political action ate verbal performances. Declaring Independence, no
less than Founding a Constitution are actions not only inconceivable without language,
but without, at least to me, any evident residual non-linguistic content."?
Some of the most exciting reincerpretive work on the French revolution associated with
the names of Francois Furet, Lyon Hunt and Keirh Baker has insisted not only on a kind of
intimate relationship between social reality and language, but on the constitutive character
of the language of revolution. Inasmuch as 'social and political arrangements are linguisti-
cally constituted (..) efforts to change them (or to presetve them) can never occur outside
of language C.) social and political changes are linguistic.'?" The revolution was first and
foremost a linguistic act, it was by inventing and deploying the language of revolution that
the Revolutionaries effected one. To understand it III this way is 'to emphasize its character
as a cultural construction - a symbolic ordering of human experience - rather than as a pre-
determined [or, one might add, even a non-predetermined] social process.?' Indeed one
might argue that the failure of the British radicals to effect a similar revolution is to be ex-
plained by their failure to perform the appropriate linguistic actions. They for the most
part, became bogged down in the interpretive question of whether they had, already per-
formed the act in question in 1688, rather than devoting themselves to the business of
declaring or performing it in the 1790s.
7l
It is only if we can conceive of moving beyond
politics to the realms of naked power, that we can move beyond the linguistic world, yet all
social power is exercised linguistically. We can indeed kill Kings with swords or axes, but it
is only with words that we can abolish monarchies. In this sense is the pen truly mightier
than the sword, and to this extent too, linguistic reality and action cannot be seen as con-
ceptually distinct from an independently existing political or social reality: political reality
cannot be other than linguistically constituted.
A second point concerns the different relationship which a language-focus sees between
its internal parrs and its own existence over time, from that suggested by Koselleck for
BegriffigesclJichte. Begriffigeschichte, he claims, seeks to establish the diachronic dimension,
along and within the changes observable in particular distinct concepts, by extracting these
from their synchronic contexts and then only subsequently reassembles these discrete
strands in order to recreate a torality" He claims that it is only by doing so that the tension
48 HISTOJ<YOF CONCErTS
between a social or political concept 'and its corresponding structure' or its 'extra linguistic
content' can be recovered." This is revealing both of the assumption that conceprs in some
kind of way represent or correspond to an independent social reality and rhar concepts not
only are hut must be traceable independently of the linguistic contexts in which they are
deployed."
Anglophones, by contrast, not only stress the linguistic constitution of political reality,
they see conco:pts as necessarily taking their meaning from the specific patterns of dis-
course, or more grandly, theories within which they are deployed. Diachronic change oc-
curs within and can only be recognized Il1 the context of, larger units - languages, dis-
courses. Even those anglophone writers who have become involvedin the analysis o/individual
concepts have characteristically insisted that 'concepts are never held or used in isolation,
bur in constellations which make up entire schemes at belief systems. These schemes or be-
lief systems are theories...'7(' Diachronic analysis on this view must operate primarily at the
language/discourse level, and not at that of the concept, since it is only within the language
that use-change can be observed?"
One further poim which relates back to the connection between the history of thought
or speech and social history. The programmatic statements about Begriffigeschichte, share
with social history the tendency to see history as a field of impersonal processes, in which
humans are almost passive vehicles. Conceptual change is a process, the locutions charac-
teristically used to describe its dynamic are natural metaphors: 'flow, processes, phenom-
enon, structure'," rather than being driven by identifiable agents."
By contrast the two anglophone writers I have discussed - Skinner perhaps more than
Pocock - see linguistic change as the actions - sometimes admittedly, incompletely com-
prehended - of agents, and both the questions they tend to ask as well as the way they seek
to answer them seem to presume that explaining linguistic change involves catching a lan-
guage user red-handed - in the [speech] act as it were. To what extent history is a history of
agent's acts, as opposed to processes is a matter for dispute, and it might be a political as
well as an historical issue. Skinner at least sees the recovery of agency as incompatible with
the history of an idea, for what
'we cannot learn from any such history is in the first place, what part, the given idea
may have played in the thought of any individual thinker (..) what questions the use of
the expression was thought to answer, what status the idea may have had, what point
(..) or range of uses it may have sustained (..) there isno history of the idea to be
written but only a history necessarily focussed on the various agents who used the idea
and their varying situations and intentions in using it."
Now - particularly in recent French thought - seeing particular languages, their concepts
and configuration as constitutive of the human world and history can seem to entail the
denial of human agency, and to present speakers, authors and actors as determined by the
language and texts which they appear to perform. This is to reproduce within the linguistic
construction of reality, the determinism which pervades some kinds of material history. But
the stress on linguistic agency makes the opposite claim, and rightly so, it seems to me: for
SPEECH ACTS. LANGUAGES OR CONCFPTUAI HISTORY' 49
whilst men (and, as is increasingly recognised, women) do not make their history in the
linguistic circumstances which they have chosen, they do nevertheless make their history.
Making history involves deploying the available language(sl in innovative, creative, and
agent-full ways. To wish that they could do so without language - which must always be a
specific language - is to believe, with Kant's dove, that their creative flight would be less
constrained without the only medium which III fact makes it possible at all.
50 HISTORY Or CO"CEI'TS
CHAPTER 4
Concept - Meaning - Discourse.
Begriffsgeschichte reconsidered'
HANS ERICH BOOEKER
I.
'Begriffigeschichte in a narrow sense', as Reinharr Kcselleck, one of the leading protagonists
of the history of concepts, once succinctly stated, 'is a historiographic achievement. It is
concerned with the history of forming. using, and changing concepts."
Begriffigeschichte - the history of concepts - deals with the synchronic and diachronic in-
terpretation of words viewed as 'concentrations of multiple meanings" and 'lead concepts
of historical movement".' Their analysis generates structures and greater contexts of events.
These 'basic concepts' are viewed simultaneously as indicators of extra-linguistic objects -
such as changing social structures - and as Factors or promoters of historical development -
such that in society they carry out actions. Begriffigeschichte aims to identify the social scope
of concepts, makes an issue of the binding, influencing power that concepts exert on politi-
cal and social groups, and deals with epochal changes in social and political structures to
the extent they can be grasped in linguistic terms as a shifting in experience, expectations,
and theory.'
Only in this dual interpretation oflanguage as both indicator and factor does the meth-
odology of Begriffigeschichte constitute a research field of its own.
Different dimensions of Begriffigeschichte can be worked out under these premises.' First
of all, it is a complementary subject to the (historical) social sciences and linguistics in that
it offers a specialized method of source criticism which analyzes the meanings of central
concepts. Second, it is very closely tied to social history, representing as it were the 'condi-
tio sine qua non of social history issues'." Begriffigeschichte supplements its synchronic
analyses, which focus on situation and time frame, with diachronic analyses, which follow
changes over time in the meanings of concepts, bringing this all together in the history of
the concept. The various diachronic layers of a concept alone serve to derive long-term
structural changes. It would be inadmissible to be too quick to equate analyses of
Begriffigeschichtewith those of social history.
. Translated from German by Allison Brown.
CU"CFPT - MEANIN(, - [)IS( :OURSF HEl;RIHS(;FSCHICHn: RECONSIDERED 51
Finally, Begriffig($c!Jichte constitutes itself to the extent that it methodologically main-
tains its assumptions through a subsidiary function as a separate branch of science, the sub-
ject of which is the linguistic expression of changes in experience and theory.
Begriffigeschichte can make structural statements on the basis of the temporal relationship
between event and structure, and the non-simultaneity of the simultaneity of concepts and
objects. These statements, in the form of hypothetical inquiries and challenges, can be
aimed at a social history that has always been concerned with structures, time periods, and
simultaneity.
Begriffigeschichte, as founded by Koselleck, makes use of the same methods as hisrorico-
critical textual analysis, hypotheses in a traditional history of ideas and (social) history, and
sernasiological and onomastic analyses taken from linguistics." The 'method' used by
Koselleck's Begriffigeschichte was conceived as a critique of traditional philosophical and
philological forms of Begriffsgeschichre. In 'Social History and Begriffigeschichte' (I972),
Koselleckdeveloped two central elements of the new approach:
Criticism of the uncritical transfer of present and temporally fixed expressions of
constitutive life to the past' and 'criticism of the history of ideas, insofar as these are
introduced as constants."
Modern Begriffigeschlchte emerged in contrast to a history of events and politics oriented
merely toward a chronological series of events, to posirivistic, 'antiquated' historiography
that rejects even the heuristic use of theories and hypotheses, and to a history of ideas void
of its socio-political context, i.e., a shrunken form of historicism to which it certainly can-
not be reduced. It would thus also be wrong to equate Begriffignchlchte oriented toward
structural history with a critique of historicism.
The concept of Begriffigeschichte is closely tied to the joint work Geschichtliche
Grundbegriffi (Basic Concepts of History).') The starting hypothesis of the book is a so-
called bridge period from 1750 through 1850, W during which - accompanied by the disso-
lution of corporauvely structured society - the socio-political world of concepts also under-
went fundamental changes leading up to modern times. This hypothesis has definitively
influenced considerations on the method used in Begriffigeschichte. It is then specified fur-
ther by the assumptions that: (1) concepts previously known only among the educated are
gaining access to other social classes (democratization); (2) that basic concepts are serving
more and more as polemical weapons, thus becoming ambiguous (ideologizabiliry). and
(3) that - at the expense of the experiences they comprise - they are assuming more and
more expectations and goals, thus having become future-oriented 'concepts of movement'
(remporalizarion' and 'poliricizarion'}. The working hypotheses are merely heuristic
anricipaticns and results of efforts for and on Geschichtliche Grundbegriffi, sub-tided 'His-
torical Dictionary of Sociopolitical Language in Germany'. 1I
'The dictionary is related to the present', as Koselleck explains its purpose, 'insofar as it
deals with the linguistic record of the modern world, its becoming conscious, and its creat-
ing consciousness through concepts that include our own';'! Research on Begriffigeschichte
52 HISTORY Of CONCEPTS
cannot be reduced to these hypotheses. Koselleck himself recently said that 'hypotheses
about the existence of such a period play no part in the method used in Begri./figeschichte',13
The work was received positively as a programme of a historical view of language, but
was criticized in that in some respects it was not on a par with the original prospectus."
The lexical organization was criticized as being neither optimal nor adequate in differenti-
aring hypotheses of Begri./figesc/;irhte according to social and communicative references.I';
At the core of the criticism, again and again, was also the issue of the selection of sources in
the articles, namely that these 'basic concepts' lead to 'lofty notions on the history of ideas'
that prefer the great 'canonized' theorists from Aristotle to KarI Marx, without proving that
they were representative of society and without their making their way into the everyday
language of politics." With that, critics felt the level of a traditional history of ideas was not
surpassed and, by not having socially representative sources, socio-historical standards were
not met.
Objections to a limitation on 'representative' philosophical texts were directly connected
to criticism of the essentially diachronic trend expressed by the Begri./figeschichte studies.
In addition to reservations regarding research methods, criticism was fired with respect
to the theoretical, methodological approach of Begri./figeschichte. From a linguistic perspec-
tive, the partly intuitive methodological foundations that fluctuated between linguistic and
historical premises, such as the conceprualizarion of the relationship between history of the
word and that of the concept, were criticized. Parallel to that is the basic objection that the
socio-historical relevance of Begri./figeschichte could not be convincingly justified 111 theo-
retical terms. Aspects of this criticism have been taken up by the new variant of
Begri./figeschichte as conceived, and to some extent realized, by Rolf Reichardt. 17
In order to measure the options and limitations of hypotheses pertaining to the history
of concepts, it is necessary to explore the structure of'meamog' (III); the question of how a
'word' refers to an 'object' (IV) and the possible relationships between Begriffigeschichte and
discourse history (V) must also be discussed. However, this examination must start with
the 'concept' (II), the central object through which to access Begriffigeschichte. Some of the
criticism of theory formation in Begri./figeschichte has evolved from claims that the theory of
the 'concept' is inaccessible, since it remains unexplained in terms of linguistic philoso-
phy." This essayaims to take us yet a step further, even if it is not possible in many respects
to entirely explain open questions and methods of a potential Begri./figeschichte.
n.
Research in the field of Begri./figeschichte has its basis in words; terms; in general. linguistic
signs. It does not deal with words as singular graphemes, however, but as symbols for cat-
egories of similar words, or words of a special kind. A constitutive property of
Begriffigeschichte is the distinction between word and concept - a distinction that is by all
means problematic in linguistics, epistemology, and a theory of signs. In concise terms,
Koselleck regards conceprs as nothing more than words with a special historical meaning."
CONCEPT _Mr.AN1N<; _DISCOURSE BEGRlffSGESCH1CHTE RVC:ONS1DlfU'.\) 53
Thus the subject of Begriffigeschichte emerges only as an outcome of the research process it-
self.
Koselleckhas repeatedly tried to grasp the difference between word and concept in theo-
retical terms. He Fundamentally sees the distinction as qualitative, as one of different sign
types seen from the same perspective. "The meaning of the word', he once wrote
paradigmarically,
always refers to that which is meant, whether a train of thought or an object, etc. The
meaning is therefore fixed to the word, but it is sustained by the spoken or written con-
text, and it also arises our of the situation to which it refers, Aword becomes a concept if
this context of meaning in which - and for which the word is used, is entirely incorpo-
rated into the word itself. The concept is fixed to the word, but at the same time it is
more than the word."
Therefore, a concept is a word that has 'incorporated the full extent of the context of mean-
ing in which the word is used'. Words thus have 'potential meanings'. Concepts inherently
bring together a 'wealth of meanings' and, 'in contrast to words, they are always ambigu-
ous' .21 A 'wealth of meanings that cannot be divided into different potential meanings' - if
this is an accurate expression of Koselleck's intended understanding of the terminology,
then his concept of 'concept' coincides with the use of the term III the philosophy of lan-
guage to describe second degree predicates, the meaning of which is obtained by abstrac-
rion."
This distinction exists largely due to evidence offered by empirical examples. At the
same time, according to Koselleck, words and concepts should also be distinguishable in
terms of definition." And on top of that, for both, the 'ambiguity' that always emerges
should faciliraresmooth transitions between the categories. It is obvious that the concept of
ambiguity is in fact indispensible in explaining shifts and new relations in historical argu-
ments.
Koselleck sees concepts, in contrast to words as 'concentrations of multiple meanings
that are incorporated into the word from the historical reality, which is different in every
case (..). PUt succinctly, the meaning of words can be defined more exactly, concepts can
only be inrerprered.?" A multiplicity of interpretations is Koselleck's criterion for a concept
as a way of perceiving and as a schematic for interpreting historical reality. This concept of
'ambiguity' or 'multiple meanings'," which can in part be traced to linguistic features of
some words, should make it possible to draw methodological links to questions of social
history and ideology criticism.
The 'concepts' of Begriffigeschichte cannot be explained using the methods of linguistic
semantics," as the premises of BegriffigcschidJtc allow neither a generally accepted defini-
tion of a concept not its cxrensional determination. Consensually indisputable meanings
can serve neither as indicators of nor as factors in the social process. They remain incon-
spicuous, giving no reason for a conflicting iurerpreraeion and ruling out any conceptual
dynamics. Only that which is uncertam as a name and potentially controversial according
54 HISTORY Or CONCFl'TS
to its assignment to 'objects' offers grounds for discursive turbulence, thus becoming his-
torically conspicuous.
Begrlffsgeschichte views a concept as a collection of experiences and expectations, per-
spectives and explanations, of historical reality. Therefore, from the outset, a concept exists
within a theoretical constellation or conceptual diagram. A single concept can hardly be
understood without reference to other concepts." Begriffigeschichte seen as a history of
knowledge conveyed through language must always keep the relational structure of the
concepts in the field of vision. It is not an individual concept that forms the subject of con-
sciousness in Begriffigeschlchte, but the whole of a mutually self-supporting concepcualiry
Concepts organized into structured aggregates define each other reciprocally. From the
start, then, the subject of Begriffigeschichte is the classification of the concepts. In other
words, Begriffigeschichte analyzes concepts as elements in a semantic or linguistic field. In
this sense it follows, as Koselleck states, that 'the investigation of a concept cannot be car-
ried out purely semasiologically; it can never limit itself to the meanings of words and their
shifts in meaning'. ,8 Research in Begriffigeschichte goes beyond the history of the word, de-
termining semantic structures. In particular, opposite, related, and parallel expressions
must be analysed in detail in their relation to the term under investigation. In addition to
synonymous and equivalent expressions, attention must also be paid to related judgmental
concepts (Wertungshegriffi). Judgments, and generally the potentially competitive or strate-
gic character of expressions or definitions of concepts, must also be examined.
These 'intentional components'," which need to be put in concrete terms, generally also
with respect to individual utterances and speakers, are what is meant when attempts at
conceptualization in Begriffigeschichte continually demand conrextualizarion. Only then
will discursive strategies be incorporated into contexts of social action.
Different types of concepts appeat in passing in Koselleck's continued efforts to deter-
mine a concept of Begriffigeschichte, though he never explains them. In his 'Introduction',
for example, he mentions constitutional concepts (Verfassungsbegriffi), key words, self-
namings (Selbstbenennungen), lead concepts (Leitbegriffi), core concepts, etc.-
10
More mean-
ingful from a Begriffigeschichte perspective, however, are concepts such as 'struggle concepts'
(Kampfbegriffi), 'future concepts', 'goal concepts', and 'expectation concepts'." These
words name possible functions that concepts can assume in argumentative contexts. All of
them indicate that the concepts do nor serve theoretical knowledge alone. A 'struggle con-
cept" for example, describes the pragmatic function that a word has in political confronta-
tion. 'Staacsburger' (citizen) was a struggle concept used by Prussian reformers around
1800, since it indicated a 'polemical goal' directed against the 'traditional, corporattvely
structured society' and 'corporative inequality of rights' ..l2 'Sraatsburger'. as a new word,
was a 'struggle concept', since any use of it demanded as it were the aspired equality from
all those who refused to relinquish their traditional privileges.
Again and again, Koselleck stresses that a 'should' can also be included within the con-
cepts. In writing about the word 'Sraarsburger'. he says that it refers, before the fact, 'to a
constitutional model yet to be implemented' ..ll This type of wording can often be found in
Koselleck's works, for example, when he speaks of 'future concepts' serving 'to linguistically
pre-formulate positions (to be achieved in the furure}'?', Ot when he later speaks of democ-
CONCEPT _MEANING _ BECRIHSGESCHICHTF RECONSIDERED 55
racy as an 'expectation concept', which then gradually forces all other constitutional forms
'into a state of illegaliry?", or when he once said that in the course of historical develop-
ments, the 'demand for implementation' inherent in many concepts continuously growS..16
With that, Koselleck expresses an awareness that a word that seems to simply name the es-
sence of objects or things can actually at the same time be used to express a 'should'. This is
especially noticeable in Kosellcck's use of the German gerundive (zu ienoirldichende - to be
implemented; zu errineende - to be achieved), such as in the words 'illegality' and 'de-
mand', the meaning of which Koselleck says could be contained in the concepts. He thus
makes it cleat that the virtual aim and function of historical concepts is especially to express
a 'should'. In doing that, Koselleck takes not only the descriptive part of a word's meaning
into account, but its prescriptive part as well; in other words, the deontic (i.e., referring to
moral obligation) meaning oflexemes. By virtue of the 'should'ccomponenrs of the mean-
ing that are inherent in and also intended by the words themselves, words serve as the vehi-
cles or abbreviations of thoughts, nor only with respect to what is, but also to what should
be.
'Movement concepts' are for Koselleck typical, strongly programmatic surpluses in the
conceptual content, combined with a nominative lack of clarity."
This makes tangible a dimension of Begriffigeschichte that Koselleck never explicitly
theorizes on, but often expresses. It is a dimension in which concepts function as struggle
concepts, goal concepts, etc. in such a way that they stand for, and are used for thoughts
that are condensed, so to speak, in them. The word always calls the thought to mind; it is
coined in the context of the thought and in order to express it succinctly. Hence the word is
a reference cipher or abbreviation for the thought. Without the thought, the word cannot
be at all understood. Every time the word IS repeated, the thought is revived, since - as that
which is presupposed - it must continually be made real in the present in order for the
word to be understood in the context in which it is uttered. It is true to the same extent for
struggle concepts as for future, goal, and action concepts that through them, the respective
thoughts subsumed under them are rehearsed and inculcated every time they are actively
spoken, or even heard or read. Every time a word is used, it contributes to the reinforce-
ment or abandonment of one language usage or another. This competition among words
and their meanings is of historical interest precisely because the difference in language us-
age is accompanied by a difference in thought usage. 'Every concept serves to set certain
horizons and limits of potential inquiry and imaginable theory:" If, in agreement with
Koselleck, one understands [he concept, or word, as a reference cipher, a vehicle used by
thoughts, then it is obvious that regarding the habitual use of certain words - such as 'class' -
habitual thinking of commonplace thoughts is implied and, over and over again, induced.
This is often indicated by historians in particular.
Later efforts at conceprualizarion within the scope of Begriffigeschichte have been able to
continue along the lines of these approaches, which viewa concept as a function that is filled
with changing arguments, thereby acquiring its predicative character. This is how Rolf
Reichardt attempts to classify using the headword 'Basrille' - the semantic field that is
staked OUt by words connected with this word in a text. He divides the associated words into
four categories. The paradigmatic field of reference includes concepts and phrases that 'di-
56 HISTORY Of CONCEl''I'S
reedy define' the concept under examination. The symagmaric field of reference iscomprised
of words connected to the concept under examination that 'give it content, describe it, and
dearly delimit it'. A third category is made up of''conceprs and names that describe the causes
and creators of the 'Bastille' and its intended practice', and, finally, the fourth category in-
cludes all systematic opposites (functional antonyms) of the examined concept. I')
Reichardr carefully distinguishes the different practical realms of communicative utter-
ances. Their analysis, as well that of the supporting layers of the concepts, are essential ele-
ments of a Begriffigeschichte based on a history of consciousness. His analyses approach his
study on everyday consciousness and the related linguistic constitution and its conditions.
The associated fields at the core of the analysis, here, are actual 'head-words', the sole pur-
pose of which is to indicate the formation and changes in episremic networks, without im-
parting any consciousness-constituting force to the headwords themselves. This also applies
for Koselleck. For him, roo, a concept viewed as a linguistic or cognitive structure has as lit-
tle immanent dynamics as does a word: 'It does not move, it is moved'," and by that he
means in its usage.
Ill.
As long as the relationship between concept and meaning is not clarified, the
historiographic Begriffigeschichte - in the sense of a history of consciousness - is constantly
in danger of remaining merely a history of ideas." Are concepts, as meanings of expres-
sions, language-immanent phenomena? In other words, does a word refer ro something ex-
tra-linguistic by the mere fact that it expresses a concept, or not until it becomes the term
(Bezeichnung) for manifestations included within the concept? Do we assume concrete or
abstract entities behind the meanings of an expression? Or is the meaning of an expression
asserted in the way it is used in language? These questions basically point to two opposing
explanations. On the one hand, 'meaning' is described as a characteristic of words or sen-
tences; on the other hand, as an event or process in which linguistic signs obtain a meaning
only if they take on a function in a communicative act. In that case, the meaning of an ex-
pression is the way it is used in language. The methodology in Gacbicbdiche Grundbegrifje
leaves the concept of meaning generally undefined. At the core of his discussion of meth-
ods used in Begriffigeschichte, Reinharr Koselleck said that:
The meal1lngof a word always refers to that which is meant, whether an idea or an
object. The meaning is therefore fixed to the word, but it is sustained by the content
intended by the thought, by the spoken or written context, and by a social siruarion.v
This distinguishes between the meaning of the word and the referential relarion. A word is
not used to refer to that which is meant; rather, the 'meaning' refers to ir." In addition to
the sign-to-object relation of a classical theory of signs, here Koselleckintroduces the word-
to-thought relation. The thought, linking word and object as the third pole of the triangle,
was considered that which is described. The thought in that concept is replaced in
Koselleck's theory by the meaning. Meaning is thus no longer the relation of a sign to that
UJNCFI'T MFAN1NC - DISCOURSE. llH;RIFI'SC1'SCHICllTE RECONSIDERED 57
which is described; instead, it is an episcemic entity not defined in detail that can itself, in
turn, be seen in relation to that which is described.
In this conceptualization, meaning becomes something sracically fixed to the word itself.
It seems as if scholars of Begriffigeschichte assumed that 'meaning' or 'sense' is to be under-
stood as object-like, or tangible. This as it were essentialistic conception of meaning views
the relation between linguistic signs and their meanings as more or less fixed relations of
two invariable mngnirudes. Acts of meaning-forming linguistic communication, in this
conception, are ascribed to the meanings - fixed, identical, and essential- of the individual
linguistic signs. The use of the concept is thus envisioned as something added accidentally
to the meaning of the word. The concept-critical model pays little attention to the poten-
tia! diversity of possible communicative meanings and to potential dependence, with re-
spect to situation and context, of linguistic use of signs. An understanding of concepts as
'words containing considerable meaning' rules out the cognitive function of the communi-
cative act in constructing the concept.
Behind the necessary link between semasiology and onomastics III practical
however, as repeatedly asserted by Koselleck, is the view that abstract
objects can be known and analysed, independent of their being recorded in linguistic terms
- i.e. words that describe them. Yet this contradicts the proclaimed goal of hisroriographic
Begriffigeschlchte to attain the constitution of reality contained therein with the aid of an
analysis of meaning of linguistic communication about historical experience. The attempt
to situate hisroriographic Begriffigeschichte between semasiology and onomastics - or a his-
wry of words and a history of things, or experience and ideas';') - carries a risk that concept-
critical analyses will not achieve any of their episremic goals, either because they are too
rash to subordinate one to the other, or because they strongly bias one pole.
Conceptualization efforts in Begriffigeschichte have often not been able to avoid equating
'concept' and 'meaning' by considering them more or less static 'ideas'. This paved the way
in practical Begriffigeschichte for the traditional history of ideas to be revised, burying in-
sight into the specifically linguistic aspect in the construction of knowledge and reality.
However, conceptualizarions of Begriffigeschichte are also based on the possibility of
grasping a concept as a category that conceives cognitive achievements in connection with
linguistic acts of communication. KoseIleck posits this dimension in his introduction to
the Geschicbtliche Grundbegri./ft, stating: 'The Begriff(..) must retain multiple meanings in
order to be a ..) The meaning of words can be defined mote exactly, concepts can
only be interpreted."?
Koselieck distinguishes between 'pure words' and 'concepts' with respect to their capac-
ity to have a fixed meaning. This distinction serves to assert that the history of use that is
called up assumes greater proportions for some concepts rhan for others. Even if linguists
do not agree with the claimed difference in the capacity of words to have a fixed meaning,
this does not change the fact that in conceptualizations in terms of a history of concepts,
the process of meaning formation is in principle incorporated at least to some extent in the
communicative interaction. This is demonstrated by Koselleck's insistence that the use of
concepts in historical contexts be examined, as well as through his desire to determine the
'social scope' of concepts."
58 11IS](lRY OF (:(lNCFI'TS
Scholars of Begriffigeschichte see the contexts of meaning as tracing back to the use of in-
dividual (concepr'<Iwords. which are intended as such to be the focus and concentration of
diverse reference structures. In reconstructing these contexts of meaning, there is a constant
risk of overestimating rhe functions that individual words assume in the continuum of
communicarive actions and texts. This can result in idealizing linguistic units which do not
take on their understood existence until subjected to analysis, making them substantial fac-
tors in the construction of consciousness. Concepts do not acquire the significance for an
analysis of consciousness that Koselleck and other scholars of Begriffigeschichte attribute to
them until taking on this analytic function as an 'overview of the non-updated combina-
tion of semantic features' and as the 'structural composite of potential uses'. They are nor
seen as units of current language-use in which words always have a current meaning.
More than Koselleck, Reichardr emphasizes rhe linguistic construction of consciousness.
'Social history is the history of concepts', he expounded, in contrast to Kosellcck, 'not so
much because concepts mirror the material reality of the past in a more or less broken fash-
ion, but above all insofar as they are based on the social character of the language.':"
Reichardt, too, agrees in the end with the working hypothesis of Begriffigeschichte; that
history can expose a 'material reality' behind the linguistic construction of consciousness
(which as such is always historical and, consequently, relative). More precisely than in tra-
ditional Begriffigeschichte, he attempts to distinguish between the social reality of historical
times, on the one hand - which history can better access if it analyzes everyday sources that
participate In the historical process and do not 'merely' reflect on it - and the historically
relative consciousness of the respective contemporaries, on the other - which is influenced
by linguistically constructed knowledge. Reichardt is aware that the historical conscious-
ness of social institutions and processes of an epoch are at least as influenced by 'institu-
tional' sources as by social reflection. This is obvious when he states that,
by means of everyday experiences, the meanings of concepts (..) [form] sedimenred stocks
of 'social knowledge' put into language that participate in 'processesof meaning forma-
tion' from sensory perception, selection of subjects and motive structures, to action."
Thus Reichardr sees meaning-formation processes about social reality as being controlled
by the overall context of linguistic, social action. The social use of language to be analyzed
includes everyday actions in social institutions and processes, as well as reflections on real-
ity. Accordingly, the practical side of Begriffigeschichte looks beyond the analysis of indi-
vidual products of language to the language standards and conventions of society that sub-
stantiate them. Nevertheless, this variant of Begriffigeschichte, too, is not aimed at a 'con-
struction' of 'objects' in a comprehensive sense by means of spoken language; rather, it is an
attempt at a normative summary, standardization, and flexible differentiation of certain
potenrials for meaning and sense.50 In other words, 'social communication constructs the
object as an object that is typically ordered and summarized in a certain way, but it does
nor construct the "material" organized in a standardizing manner'." Even this version of
hisroriographical Begriffigeschichtedoes not go so far as to grasp 'meaning' in Wingenstein's
sense as 'use'.12
cot\'crPT - MEANINC - DISCOURSE. flFCRlf'FSC!'SUlIClITE RFCONSlDERED 59
According to such an understanding, knowledge of the use of a word would be knowl-
edge of its communicative validity or, to be more precise. knowledge of the 'meaning'."
rv
The central theoretical claim in Koselleck's understanding of Begriffigeschichte is that 'exter-
nal history' is incorporated into Begriffigeschlchte, and that the two mutually refer to each
other. This makes the relation of 'words' to 'objects' a key problem for Begriffigeschichte. Ac-
cording to Koselleck, Begrijfigeschichte is 'concerned with the convergence of concept and
history'. 54 In contrast to the claims of linguistic methods, Koselleck declares precisely the
socio-political function of the relationship between word and object to be the subject of re-
search in Begriffigt'Schichte. jS Thus Begriffigeschichte encompasses the entire field of interac-
tion that exists between the subjecr areas that include concepts and the language through
which the concepts are articulated. Each of them, the subject areas and the language, has its
own history, which are held together by the demands of Begriffigeschichte. In this sense,
Koselleck sees 'concepts' as superordinare units that connect 'word' and 'object'. They have
two dimensions. On the one hand, they refer to something extra-linguistic, i.e., the context
in which they are used. On the other hand, this context, this historical reality, is perceived
in linguistic categories. 'Put metaphorically, concepts are like joints linking language and
the extra-linguistic world:
5
!>
Koselleckhas interpreted the relationship between word and object by generally describ-
ing the source language of a particular epoch as 'metaphors for history'. '7 However, his
many attempts to determine this relationship have been rather vague; for example, he has
said that word and object refer to one another reciprocally, correspond to each other, and
exist in a mutual tension, but they never merge into one.
In the methodological concept of Geschichtfiche Grundbegriffi, two perspectives typically
appear juxtaposed and unrelated: first, the relationship between words and objects as an ex-
ternal relation between two independently identifiable factors, and second, the interpreta-
tion that the existence and way of functioning of one is a prerequisite for the other.
Some of Koselleck's expositions on the concept of Begriffigeschichte give the impression
that a concept has referential qualities only. His thoughts that a hisrorico-semannc analysis
should expose the history of the object that lies behind the concepts can be interpreted in
this way. In his interpretation of concepts 'as indicators of historical movement', among
others, the danger of a problematic, realistic ontology appears, which fixes 'objects' as 'enri-
tidY But can historical objects even be seen as 'objects', as is the case with things of every-
day life?
On the other hand, Kosellecks project by no means assumes a thorough correspondence
of words, concepts, and objects. He correctly indicates that 'preserved (durchgchalrene)
words (..) rare] not in and of themselves sufficient indications of unchanging objects'. ")It is
precisely the discrepancies that comprise the essential epistemological interest of
Begriffigeschichte.
60 HISTORYOF CONCFl'"IS
The methods used by Begriffigeschichte, instead, break through the naive circular
argument leading from word to object and back (..). Rather, there is a tension precisely
between concept and object that can lift, can reappear, or can become virtually perma-
nent. Again and again, a hiatus between social objects and the language use aimed at or
transcending them can be registered. Changes in meanings of words and changes in
objects, siruationa] changes and pressure to rename objects correspond with each other
in respectively different ways.till
Hence there is no reason to assume that the end of changes in Begriffigeschichte are in sight,
at least not as long as 'language' and 'object' are in an ongoing process of change.
In the 1980s, Koselleck developed - in a series of attempts - what he believes should he
understood by 'object'. In 'Social History and Begriffigeschichte', he tries to explain an 'oh-
jeer' that transcends conceprualizarion:
There are thus extra-linguistic, pre-linguisnc (and post-linguistic) elements in all acts
that lead to a history. They are closely attached to the elemental, geographical, biologi-
cal and zoological conditions all of which affect occurrences in society by way of the
human constirution.v'
Consequently, 'objects' are for him 'comprehended and conveyed in linguistic terms'.
In the debate on structuralistic discourse theory, Koselleck recently explained his
conccptualization of the relationship between word and object, or, to put it in another way,
language and reality. Here, using the example of the French Revolution, he has worked out
three options:
(a) In principle language can be understood insrrumenrally and examined in socio-
linguistic terms in its function for political action groups. Language always remains an
epiphenomenon of so-called real history.
(b) Language and reality can he placed in a mutual relationship to each other by
determining differences, without their being entirely reducible to each other. For
Luckmann, for example, it has to do with a linguistic world of meaning formation that
both releases and limits - to the same extent - possible experiences in the real world. I,
myself, use a dual aspect for Begriffigeschichte, in which concept formations are both a
factor in historical movements and an indicator of those very movements. Reality is
always conveyed through language, which does not rule out its also having non-
linguistic constitutional conditions.
(c) The third possibility is sharply opposed to the first. Here, texts are taken as reality
itself, which is Poucault's position. By neutralizing the social classification of texts and
episremologically equating all potential textual statements, text is reduced to text only,
without its being able to he read as a source for something. This approach C.) is meth-
odologically consistent, though it leavessome questions open. This would mean that
history is tied only to language. It would then be just as consistent for German
hiscoriography about French texts to he impossible, and vice versa. History would then
U J:-.JCEI'T MEANJNC . DJSCOURSF. BEGRlrFSGESCHICHTE RECONSlDFRED 61
face danger of being conceivable only as a history of consciousness. Texts would be
silent as it were in view of semantics, which always refers beyond itself, namely, to the
object concerned.s-
It is precisely the prerequisite of a meshing of diachrony and synchrony, and the 'precondi-
tion that historical change and duration be traced at the same rime'v' that would have to
prevent viewing the relationship between concept and object as identical simply because
the concepts ate identical.
Koselleck's warning against breaking down history into discourse corresponds to his
theory that 'no speech act is the act itself, which it helps to prepare, trigger and carry out'.(,4
The premise that there is a difference between occurring history and its linguistic facilita-
tion thus determines Begriffsgeschichte methods.
Later, however, he seems to accept both the active character and the meaning-formation
role of speech acts, though this is done with definitive theoretical reservations, as he warns
of linguistically reducing action: 'Even if every instance of speech comprises an act, every
action is nonetheless far from being an act of speech.'?'
Language's function In constructing meaning, despite some approaches In
hisroriographic Begriffigeschichte, has not found acceptance with respect to its full conse-
quences. This probably comes from the efforts of some scholars of Begriffigeschichte to find
'structures', 'movements', and 'contexts' with an (attributed) existence outside the history
of their being recorded linguistically.
Earlier, Koselleck had already presented objects to be explained in terms of a concept
analysis as extra-linguistic, even though at the same time he stressed that historical pro-
cesses and structures first emerge as conscious objects through the context of use of the de-
scriptive words. This would make it possible to reduce to the search for
appropriate word-use contexts for objects that already exist since they were prerequisites for
the analysis in the first place. To be more precise, there IS a risk of Begri./figeschichte losing its
cognitive function of recognizing historical reality as a structure of consciousness - tied to
language, which affords accessibility - and thus an object-construction as well.
Understanding the conceprualiry of past epochs is prerequisite to moving on to the 'ob-
ject' itself:
Research from a perspective of Begriffigeschlchte does not study unconceived historical
manifestations, but their linguistically graspable reflections in consciousness.
Begriffigeschichtl! thus does nor ask, for example, what 'domination' (Herrschnfi') is per
se, but what has been considered 'domination' generally and with respect to different
groups."
In this sense Begriffigeschichte seeks the self-image of past times, how that was reflected in
concepts, and how it was expressed. In a narrow sense it does not involve an examination of
connections between history of words and history of objects; instead, it is concerned with
how concepts become indicators of and factors in processes of meaning formation.
Begriffigeschichte in this sense, i.e., oriented toward social history, does not deal with the
62 HISTORY Of CO"CEi'T.'i
mere reflection of social phenomena and their definition as concepts, but wirh rhe process
of coping wirh them intellectually.
Rcichardt's social historical semantics, with its basis in episremic sociology, expressed a
critical- albeit rentarive - distance from Koselleck's programme. He said that 'concepts and
their respective meanings [are not] mere indicators of the history of objects, but are a percep-
tive faculty, a collectiveconsciousness and action of given factors that have no less reality than
material relationships'." This depicts language and in particular socio-political conceprualiry
not primarily as an indicator of extra-linguistic objects, but rather as an essentiallyindepend-
ent social factor, an element capable of consciousness formation and action disposition.
v.
In strict opposition to viewing the traditional history of ideas as the history of 'immutable'
ideas, 'the history of concepts deals with the use of specific language in specific situations,
within which concepts are developed and used by specific speakers'r" Although
Begriffigeschichte studies generally start with an analysis of the relevant concept-word, it is
from the outset integrated into a larger word field. The orientation of a symbol toward spe-
cific linguistic signs essentially serves as a title in delimiting an area of research. In other
words, Begriffigeschichte semantically transcends the word level and the individual text
level. It does not, however, deal with individuallexcmes; rather, its focus is on a 'vocabu-
lary', an 'entire sector of language' .s" This means that Begriffigeschichte is not primarily con-
cerned with the study of individual linguistic signs, but with the episremic conditions and
discursive strategies enabling their meaningful use.
Thus Begriffigeschichtetries to make explicit the episremic and cognitive prerequisites for
use of a concept. Only in this way can it do justice to its task of explaining the processes of
historical consciousness formation by means of a historical analysis of meaning. Wotds and
their meanings in historical contexts can only be described adequately if their role in his-
torical contexts of expression is explained - including their institutional conditions and
protagonists, with all the related connections and references. Knowledge in hisrorical con-
texts can only be reconstructed or constituted if the relationships, structures, or semantic
proximity of concepts are first analysed. Relationships between individual concepts or
words can also become effective as relationships between statements, statement complexes,
or implicit semantic prerequisites for meanings of words, statements, or statement com-
plexes. At the same time, this exposing of conceptual contexts means uncovering effective
epistemic factors that are all too quickly taken for granted and thus do not become con-
scious. Begriffigrschichte as a history of consciousness aims to uncover even the deeper levels
of social experience, becoming a social history of experience.
In this sense, Begriffigeschichte was conceived to assume that concepts are always 'inher-
ently reflected upon from a social perspective'." and that they impact 'language in social
inreracrion'." This is contained in Koselleck's search for the 'intentions behind' word
meanings and their social and political contents, for the cui bono, and for the target groups
of concepts." Obviously, linguistic findings must be analyzed according to communication
situations and restrictions, group codes, and text pages.
CON(:F.l'l _~ l E N I N G DISCOURSE, BEGRIHSC;[SCHICHTI' fl.ECONSIDERED 63
Begriffigeschichte claims to represent a connection between the history of thinking and
speaking and that of institutions, facts, and events within the concept structure, which can
be viewed as discursive contexts."!
A type of semantics oriented toward contexts beyond the word level has, then, been re-
ferred to as 'discourse'. Discourse is seen as the site where linguistic signs become differenti-
ated and thus at the same time mutually interpreted. Koselleck recently responded to crit-
ics, with definitive reference to pragmatic-discursive dynamics that concepts can develop in
social communication. He stressed that a history of concepts and a history of discourse
mutually refer to one another:
Although basic concepts always function within a discourse they ate pivots around
which all arguments turn. For this reason I do not believe that the history of concepts
and the history of discourse can be viewed as incompatible and opposite. Each depends
inescapably on the other. A discourse requires basic concepts in order to express what it
is talking abour. An analysis of conceprs requires command of both linguistic and extra-
linguistic contexts, including those provided by discourses. Only by such knowledge of
context can the analyst determine what are a concept's multiple meanings, its content,
importance, and the extent to which it is conresred.?"
A more detailed analysis of these relations, however, still needs to be conducted.
64 HISTORY or CONCEPTS
PART II
Themes and Variations
CHAPTER 5
The Origin and the Meaning oJthe
Reason oJState
MAL:RIZlO VIROLl
After decades of nearly total silence, studies on reason of state are flourishing again.' Stu-
dents of history of political thought now have a much clearer picture of the diffusion of the
language of reason of state over l Zchcentury Europe. They can identify the main protago-
nisrs, visualize the lines of circulation, trace the changes and the adaptations that occurred
within the main body of the theory. And yet, though we know more about its develop-
ments, we still need to invesrigate the origin of the concept. We are yet to find a convincing
answer to the question of why the locution 'ragione di sraro' was pUt into use, if not in-
vented. Why, in other words, did 16th century thinkers who used the words 'ragione di
state" believed that conventional terms available in political language were no longer apt?
Unless we find a satisfactory answer to these questions concerning the origin of reason of
state, our understanding of the subsequent history of the language of reason of state will
also be wanting. As I have argued elsewhere, after the publication of Giovanni Borero's
De/La Ragion di Stato in 1589, a new language inspired by the concept of reason of state
spread throughout early 17th century Europe. This new language sustained and justified a
new interpretation of the goals and the means of political action. Politics was no longer un-
derstood as the art of preserving a political life through justice and the pursuit of virtues -
as the conventional definition of politics before the appearance of the concept of reason of
state recites - but the art or science of preservlllg a state - any state - by any means." The
point that still needs to be clarified is that the innovative quality of the concept of reason of
states consists in the conjunction of 'reason' and 'state', a conjunction of which we have no
examples in the conventional language of politics until the early 16rh century. In this essay,
I shall therefore focus on rwo specific questions: which reason is reason of state; which state
is reason of state the reason of?As I have remarked, the main focus of this essay is the origin
of the language of reason of state. For this reason, I must specify that I am confining my in-
quiry to Italian political thought up until the early 17th century.
Which Reason is Reason of State?
Before answering the first question - which reason? - I must stress that I am referring here
to the earliest formulations of the concept of reason of state, that is Guicciardini's Dialogo
del reggimento di Firenze and Della Casa's Oratione a Carlo V If we want to understand the
rHF ORI(;IN ANIJ"l'HE MEANIN(; OFTHE REASON OF STATE 67
historical meaning of the emergence of the concept of reason of state in those texts, we
must situate both the Dialogo and the Orationewithin two contexts: that of the conven-
tional language of politics and that of the 16th century language of the art of the state.
Since the 13th cemury, when a recognizable language of politics re-emerged, politics
held the monopoly of reason: ruling in justice, shaping JUSt laws, framing and preserving
good political constitutions were, in fact, regarded as the most genuine achievements of
reason. Politics was the exercise of reason in counselling, deliberating and legislating to pre-
serve a community of men living together in justice - reason in the sense of recta ratio in
agibilium and ratio civilis. As Brunette Larini wrote in his immensely influential Traar;
politics teaches how to rule the inhabitants of J kingdom and a city (ville] and a people and
a commune, both in times of peace and war, according to reason and justice ('selonc raison
et selonc justice') ..1
The connection between right reason, justice and politics was refined and expanded by
l zlth century jurists, most notably by Baldus de Ubaldis, who was continuing the Roman
tradition of 'civilis sapieno' or 'civilis ratio'. The source of the idiom 'civilis sapienria' was
probably Ulpian: the knowledge of civil law {civilis sapientia'}, he wrote in Bk. 50 of The
Digest, is indeed a most hallowed thing ('res sanctissima'}." A collection of similar expres-
sions like 'civil science' ('civilis scientia'}, civil philosophy Ccivilis philosophia'), civil reason
(civilis ratio')' may be found in Cicero. Unlike Ulpianus' 'civilis sapientia', Cicero's civil
science, or reason, or philosophy, does not mean just the knowledge or the competence in
civil law, but the more general art of ruling the republic, that is to say, politics, as Cicero
himself says in the De Finibus, 'the topic which I think may firly be entitled Civil Science
[quem civilem recte appellacur'] was called in Greek politikos'.\
The identification of politics and law and therefore of politics and 'recta ratio' which is
the foundation of law, found in Coluccio Salurari its most eloquent advocate. Politics and
the laws, wrote Salutati his dialogue De nobilicue legumet medecinae, are actually the same
thing f'idem esse politicam atgue leges').(, The concept of 'political reason' (polirica ratio')
that he introduces in Chapter 20 of the De nobilitatc is a synonym of the Ciceronian 'civil
reason' (tratio civilis')'!
As Cicero has taught us, writes Salurati, law is the rational norm of human life. Though
we say that law is a human creation, in fact true law comes from nature and as such its ori-
gin is ultimately divine. No human law can he called a true law if it violates the highest
norm of equity, which is theprecept a/eternal reason.' The task of political reason is that of
introducing measure, proportion and justice into the human world - a task accomplished
through law, which is the arrangement and the rule of political reason {poliricae rationis
institutio atgue preceprio'I."
If we now read the Dinlogo and the Orations in this context, we are in the position of
elucidating a first Important layer of meaning, that is that in both texts the crucial contrast
- crucial to understand the meaning of reason of state - is between two reasons: the reason
of state vs the recta ratio and the ragione civile that were the foundation of the concept of
politics that re-emerged in lSrh century Italy. Reason of state, in other words, was invoked
or mentioned as a reason that allows for a derogation from civil reason.
68 ~ T O \ Y Of Cor>"CEI'TS
Let me briefly analyse the passages in which Guicciardini introduces the concept of rea-
son of state. In the Dialogue' Cuicciardini's spokesman is Bernardo del Nero. The real
Bernardo del Nero was beheaded by the republican government in 1497 because of his
long connection with the Medici. The fictitious Bernardo represents the experienced states-
man who explains to two inexperienced republican zealots - Piero Capponi and
Paolanronio Soderini - what the preservation of a state requires in practice. In the context
of a discussion of the problems of the Plorentine dominion over Pisa and other Tuscan cit-
ies and rertirorics, Bernardo tells his interlocutors the story of the Genoese who failed ro re-
lease the prisoners they captured at the battle of Meloria in 1284, thereby inflicting an ir-
reparable blow on their Pisan enemies.
'I have no difficulty in conceding', Bemardo argues, 'rhat what the Genoese did was a
cruelty of which moral conscience can never approve. Nor can moral conscience justify a
war waged to expand or to defend dominions. Florence, like any state, has no legitimate ti-
tle over the rerrirories of the dominion. She just conquered them either by sheet force or
with money. However, since all states - with the sole exception of republics within their
own territories - are grounded on nothing but sheer violence, it is necessary for them to re-
sort to all means to preserve themselves. IfI say that it was necessary for the Genoese to kill
or to keep imprisoned the captives of war', remarks Bernardo, 'I am perhaps not speaking
as a good Christian, but I am speaking according to the reason and customs of the states'
('secondo la ragione e uso degli srati'}."
In saying that all states (even republics, insofar as they are states that hold dominion over
subjects) have their origins in violence, and that there is a reason of states that transcends
moral reason, he meant to say that the language of politics as civil philosophy was seriously
defective. He wanted to be able to say that in extreme circumstances reason may justify
cruelties and injustices. However, since the reason embodied in the conventional notion of
politics allowed no room for that, he had to appeal to another 'reason', and since no reason
in the political philosophy of the time was available, he had to construct it.
The opposition of civil reason and reason of state is also the central theme of the famous
Speech ofMonsignor Giovanni de/la Casa addressed to the Emperor Charles the V concerning
the restitution ofthe City ofPiaccnza. To return the city of Piacenza to the legitimate ruler
Duke Otravio Farnese, would be, stresses Della Casa, an act conforming to the norms of
civil reason ('la ragione civile'). To keep it, would instead be an act conforming to reason of
state, which considers only the interest of the state, disregarding all principles of justice and
honesty.
Et perche alcuni accecaci nella avarizia e nella cupidiea loro affermano che Vostra
Maesta non consentira mai di lasciar Piacenza, che che disponga la region civile,
conciosiache la ragion degli Stati nol comporta, dico che questa voce non e solamenre
poco cristiana, ma cllaeancora poco umana.
11
All that helps us, I think, to understand in part the historical meaning of the concept of
reason of state; to clarify why Guicciardini and Della Casa used that concept, but there is
more to be discovered, if we take another context into consideration, namely the confideu-
rHE OIt!CIN ANll THE 1\.lEANIN(; OETl-IE REASON Oe STATE 69
tiai, or private language of the art of the state. By confidential or private language of the an
of the state I mean the language that was spoken in private gatherings, in memoranda and
letters and in the discussions that took place, for example, in the restricted advisory bodies
of the Republic of Florence and Venice.!"
Cuicciardini himself, in the Dialogo tells us that the kind of things on the ragione Jegli
stati that he had just said should nor be discussed in public: 'la occasione ci ha rirati in
questo ragionamento, et quale si pun componare tra noi, ma non sarebbe pero da usarlo
con alrri, ne dove fussino piu persone'."
Examples of the private or confidential language of the an of the state are the records of
the Consulte and Praticbe, the semi-official boards summoned by the various Councils of
the republic (The Council of Eight, the Ten of Peace and Liberty) to give advice on issues
of domestic and foreign policy. The citizens invited to arrend the Pratiche were among the
wealthiest and most distinguished families of the city; and the records of these discussions
offer us unique documents of the political language of the 16th c. Florenrine elire."
From the records of those discussions, we can see that the usual practices of art of the
state - waging an unjust war, treating the citizens injustly, using public institutions for pri-
vate purposes, condemning an innocent, breaking an alliance, deceive, simulate - could
claim no rational justification and were justified only by appealing to the uso of the states,
not to a reason.
Reason was a key word that played a central role in the discussions of the Praiicbe. In the
Pratica summoned to debate the suspected treason of Paoio Virelfi, the participants dis-
cussed whether Virelli ought to be treated 'according to reason'; and by 'reason' they meant
'justice', following the Ciceronian notion of justice embodied in Larini's definition of poli-
rics." Since Vitelli might have been dangerous if left alive, one of the speakers said that in
his case 'we should not proceed according to the precepts of reason ['secondo e termini di
ragionc'] and that matters of state are not to be handled according to reason [e cosl non si
wale nelle cose delli star!']. 16 The usual practice of the art of the state is then invoked to
justify a decision that conrradicrs the rational principle of justice embedded in the republi-
can idea of politics. This was of course, and this point seems to me a central one, a weak
justification. As long as the art of the state could only appeal to the uso deglistati to justify
the derogation from moral or civil reason, it was condemned to remain in a position of in-
feriority with respect to the language of civil philosophy. Civil philosophy had reason on its
side; the art of the state had JUSt the uso. And even though customary practices can claim
some rights in particular circumstances before reason, reason remains the highest authority.
The endowment of the art of the state with its own reason was Cuio-iardini's (and later
Botero's). not Machiavelli's achievement. The scholars who have stressed that although
Machiavelli did not have the word, but advocated both in the Prince and in the Discorsi the
substance of what was later described as reason of state, are surely right. But the fact that he
did not bring himself to offer the derogarions from the moral and civil laws its own reason,
was not a minor detail. Without its reason, the language of the state would not have
emerged from the semi-clandestine status; it would not have gained rhe intellectual respect-
ability that it later gained. Only when it had its own reason, not just the uso, was it in the
position of successfully competing with the old language of politics.
70 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
The transition of reason of state from the pflvate or confidential to the public status, was
however neither Machiavelii's nor Cuicciardini's, but Botero's achievement. Through his
work, Borero severed the notion of reason of state and the language of the art of the state
from the negative moral connotations that had so far accompanied them. I cannot accept,
stresses Botcro, that an impious writer like Machiavelli and a tyrant like Tiberius are re-
garded as models for rhe government of states. And, above all, I hold it truly scandalous to
oppose reason of state to the lawof God and dare to say [hat some actions are justifiable on
the ground of reason of state and others by conscience. By purifying it from Machiavellian
and Tacirian connotations, Botero gave the an of the state a new, more acceptable meaning.
The whole language of the art of the state emerged into the light after a long sojourn in the
shadows of the noble language of polirics.'"
Which State is Reason of the State the Reason of?
In the case of Guicciardini's Dialogo and Della Casa's Oraeionr state means just dominion -
that is a dominion imposed by force or money, or shrewdness. It is a state that has no moral
justification whatsoever. In this sense, reason of state was the reason of the states that are
not republics.
Eel medesimo interviene a turti gli altri, perche turti gli stari, a chi bene considera la
loro origine, sonc violenri, e dalle repubblicbe in fuori, nella loro parria e non piu oltre,
non ci e potesta alcuna che sia legitima. e rneno quella deJlo imperadore che e in tanra
aurorita che da ragione agli altri: ne da quesra regola eccettuo c' preti, la violenza de'
quali edoppia, percbe a renerci sotto usono le armi spiriruah e le temporali.:"
In DeIJa Case's Oratione, it is even clear that the state of reason of state is just a domination
imposed by force. The Emperor had seized Piacenza: had he decided to keep instead of re-
turning it to the legitimate ruler, he would have acted according to the reason of state.
Borero's later definition of reason of state - 'Ragionc di Sraro e noritia di mezzi atti a
fondare, conservarc e ampliare un dominio COS! Iatto"? - does not contradict its original
meaning. By 'state' he means 'dominion' in general; hence, since a tyranny is a dominion,
reason of state can be the knowledge of the means apt to preserve a tyranny.
It is important to remark at this stage of the argument that in the Quettrocenro, histori-
ans and political philosophers used 'state' [stato] and 'republic' as mutually exclusive con-
cepts. By stato, they often meant the network of partisans loyal to a powerful citizen Ot a
family (e.g. '10 sraro dei Medici] that enabled that citizen or that family to control the gov-
ernment and the magistrates. By'republic' they meant, according to the Ciceronian defini-
tion, 'respopuli, char is the commonwealth that belongs to the people as a whole. 'State', in
this sense and 'republic' were therefore antithetical concepts, and the two corresponding
arts - the art of the state and the art of politics - were also understood as being substan-
tially different.
The difference between politics and reason of state, however, does not exclude an over-
lap. Reason of state can be also the reason of republics. JUSt as republics were also states;
-nlE ORICIN AND THE Mh\NIN(; OF HlE KEASD!': OF STATE 71
politics, at times, overlapped with the art of the state. A republic is a state vis avis other
states and their subjects, if it possesses a dominion, as was the case with Florence. More-
over, the republic is also a state in the sense of a power structure built upon the apparatus of
coercion. In dealing with other states, subjects or rebels, the representatives of the republic
may easily find themselves 'necessitated', as they used ro say, ro derogate from the rules of
civil and moral reason: fighting an unjust war unjustly, treating subjects harshly, repressing
a rebellion with cruelty. The most perceptive theorists of Renaissance Italy, Machiavelli and
Guicciardini, clearly spelled out the need for a ruler to be prepared to use both the art of
good government and the art of the state.
The theoretical and practical overlapping between politics and the art of the state do not
alter the fact, however, that the two languages competed in the Italian scenario as funda-
mental enemies, even if they did occasionally look at each other with interest or even fasci-
nation. Historically, and this is an important point, the ideology of reason of state was per-
ceived as the enemy of the republic because it justified tyranny.
Nowadays we vulgarly call reason of state, remarked Campanella in 1631 with distaste,
what once we used ro call political reason (trario demum poluica'). We call reason of state,
he wrote in the same year, the same political reason Crane pohrica') that was in the pase
identified with equity and justice. Reason of state, stresses Campanella, is in fact false poli-
tics, a degeneration of true politics (Falsam illam poliricam. quam vocatis de statu
rationem'L'"
AI; Campanella remarks in his Afonsmi politici, the ancient political reason ('ratio
polirica') should not to be confused with the modern concept of reason of state (Ratio Sta-
tus hodierna'). The former consists of equity Faequiras') and authorises the violation of the
latter - but not the aim - of the law on behalf of a higher and common good; the latter is
an invention of tyrants Cinvenrto tyrannorum'] that justifies the violation of civil, natural,
divine and international laws in the interests of whoever is in power." Other 17th century
political writers lamented that even learned people had only confused ideas about the con-
nection between politics and reason of state. As Ludovico Zuccolo wrote, some wrongly
equate politics with reason of state while others maintain that the former is just a compo-
nent of the latter without going any further than that." Elsewhere he observed that in the
common opinion politics aims at the common good, while reason of state pursues the in-
terest of the rulers.!.1
Another example of a perception of the difference between politics and reason of state
can be found in Filippo Maria Bonini's Ciro Politico (1647), Politics - he wrote is the
daughter of reason and the mother of the law; reason of state is the mother of tyranny and
the sister of atheism. Politics indicates ro the prince the right way of governing, ruling and
defending his own people both in times of peace and war. Reason of state is, on the con-
traty, the knowledge of the means - just Ot unjust - apt to pteserve any state. For this rea-
son politics is the art of princes, reason of state that of ryranrs."
Understood as the art of good government, politics was regarded by Bonini and other
17th century writers as the highest human an whose task is to fight injustice. However, this
high consideration of politics was not at all a product of the l Srh century political philoso-
phy, as it has been said, hut a reiteration of Aristotelian themes that had been circulating
72 J-IISTORYO/- UH"CFI''rS
since the 13th century and had lost most of their power after the emergence of the concept
of reason of state. Like other 17th century writers, Bonini was celebrating the old concep-
tion of politics that had been corrupted by the new concept of reason of stare." In addition
to that, it must be said that the celebrations of politics were in some cases clearly ironical in
tone. The word 'politics', wrote Giovanni Leti for example, is so sweet that nowadays every-
one wants to look for it; even the vile populace that cannot practise politics, wants at least
ro talk of ir." What he means, however, is that the word 'politics' was used in an improper
way, to conceal nefarious practices of bad government. His celebration was actually a cri-
tique of politics as his contemporaries understood and practised ir." As he perceptively ob-
served, the names of things have changed. Princes have successfully banished the frighten-
ing name of tytanny and introduced that of politics." Whereas the ancients used to call
tyranny by its name, modern politicians call it 'politics":"
The change of the meaning of politics and its loss of status also emerges in the works of
the most pius Giovanni De Luca, the author of /1 principe cristiano pratica. Modern politi-
cal writers, remarks De Luca, do not mean by politics good government and good adminis-
tration, bur the preservation and the aggrandizement of the power of a person or a family.
According to the common-sense view, politics is nothing bur lying, deceiving, and plotting
to pursue one's own interest and ambition. By current standards only fools believe that
politics is sincerity, truth and honcsry" The consequence of this ideological and linguistic
'revolution' was that 'politics' ceased to be the pleasant and noble name it used to be.
Politics ceased to be seen as the intellectual daughter of ethics and law. Matters of state,
remarked Ammiratc, cannot be taught by legalists, who know only of Civil and criminal
litigations. The prince should listen rather to the advice of political philosophers who know
about history and have studied the deeds of great princes and people. The divorce of poli-
tics and jurisprudence, however, was bitterly contested. In his Ritratto de! Priuato Politico
Christiano (1635), the Bolognese Virgilio Malvezzi wrote that law is politics (La legge c una
political, but nowadays fewlegalists are politicians (politiCl). In the past politics was the leg-
itimate daughter of jurisprudence. Now politics is a mechanical activity, and the legalists
have become empiricists..l
l
If we go back to the question that I raised at the outset of this paper, namely why poliri-
cal philosophers constructed and put into use the locution 'ragione di state', we can answer
that they did it because they needed a new concept of reason apt to excuse deroganons
from mora! and civil law imposed by the necessity to preserve or expand states understood
as dominions. And as a corollary to this, we may add that the appearance of the concept of
reason of state contributed to change the meaning and the range of application of the con-
cepl of politics. It marked the beginnings of what has been aptly called 'the politics of the
modems' as opposed [Q 'the politics of the ancients', that IS the view that politics is simply
the art of pursuing, securing, expanding power, not, as the ancients and their naive human-
ist followers seemed (or pretended) to believe, the art of founding and preserving a repub-
lic. Whether the transition from the former to the latter conception of politics should be
regarded as an intellectual progress or as a decay is a highly contested matter, but it cannot
be denied that the transition, did indeed take place; and it began when those rwo words,
reason and state were Put rogerher."
TI {leORI(;[N ANI) THI- _\IEAN[N(, or THE RFAS()N 0[' _,TAIl' 73
CHAPTER 6
Conceptual History and the History of
Political Tbought
TERENCE HALL
Concepts, like individuals, have their histories, and are just as incapable of withstand-
ing the ravages of time as are individuals.
Kierkegaard I
Four centuries ago Cervantes showed how the moral codes and concepts of one age are apt
to be unintelligible in another. In the novel that bears his name as its title Don Quixore at-
tempts, in vain and with comic results, to resurrect and to follow the code of knight er-
rantry. He does so, however, in an age that thinks and speaks in an entirely different vo-
cabulary. The bookish Don fails to recognize that the concepts constitutive of that code -
honour, chivalry, courtly love and the concept of a quest - are out of place in his time and
are meaningless [0 his contemporaries. Because Don Quixote nor only speaks and thinks
but attempts to act in accordance with this archaic code, his contemporaries see him as a
comic character and his quest (we would say nowadays) as 'quixotic'. Thus Cervantes helps
us to recognize the reality of conceptual change - and to appreciate the vast differences be-
tween past peoples' conceptually constituted practices and OUt own.
To encounter and attempt to understand these beliefs and practices in all their strange-
ness requires the stretching of our own concepts and categories. If philosophy begins in
wonder, conceptual change gives us something to wonder about in the first place. One of
the tasks of the conceptual historian is to address this sense of strangeness, of difference,
not to make it less strange or different, but to make it more comprehensible, to shed light
on past practices and beliefs, and in so doing to stretch the linguistic limits of present-day
political discourse.
My aim in this article is to sketch what I take to be several important features ofconcep-
mal history', especially as it relates to the ways in which we think about and write the his-
tory of political thought. r plan to proceed in the following way. First I shall attempt to tie
an interest in conceptual history with the 'linguistic turn' in twentieth-century philosophy.
Then I shall outline what one might (with some slight exaggeration) call two 'schools' of, or
'approaches' to, conceptual history - the German Begriffigeschichteand its Anglo-American
counterpart, with particular emphasis on the latter. Next, I shall try to delineate what I take
to be the distinguishing or defining features of politicaldiscourse as a field of investigation.
(:(IN(.I-I'H;AI HISTOkY ANIlTHE 111STORY (le l'OLlT1C:AL THOu\;IIT 75
Then I shall say something about what I call 'critical conceptual history' as an approach to
the investigation of political innovation and conceptual change. And finally, I shall con-
clude with a brief and selective defence of this perspective as it bears on the way we write
the history of political thought.
Completingthe 'Linguistic Turn'
Although the recorded history of the human species is the story of almost continuous con-
ceptual change, the political and philosophical import of this fact has too often been ig-
nored or played down by modern philosophers. There are of course a number of notable
exceptions. Hegel, Kierkegaard and Nierzsche had a lively appreciation of the hisroriciry
and mutability of our moral and political concepts. Amongst anglophone philosophers
R.G. Collingwood, Hannah Arendt, and Alasdair MacIntyre have been among the brilliant
exceptions to the dismal rule that modern philosophers. particularly of the Anglo-Ameri-
can 'analytical' variety, have tended to treat moral and political concepts as though they had
no history, or as though their having a history was a matter of little or no philosophical in-
terest or importance."
This neglect seems at first sight surprising, considering that twentieth-century philoso-
phy supposedly took a 'linguistic turn'.' And yet, in emphasizing the minute analysis and
clarification of 'the' meaning and use of particular concepts, 'linguistic' or 'ordinary lan-
guage' philosophy or 'conceptual analysis' as practised In Britain and the United States,
tended to focus upon the language of one age and culture, namely our own. This narrow-
ing not only blinded philosophers to the fact that meaning and usage change from one age
and generation ro the next, but it also led them ro believe their enterprise to be a politically
neutral one of clarifying and analysing what 'we' say, as though 'we' were a single speaking
subject, undivided by partisan differences, and unchanged and unchanging over time. In
thus assuming that there is a unified 'we', ordinary language philosophy largely ignored the
twin issues of political conflict and conceptual change.
This is not to say that the potentia] for such a focus was utterly lacking in 'linguistic'
philosophy, only that the potential was not at first realized. The cases ofWittgensrein and
]. L. Austin - two otherwise very different founders of what came ro be called ordinary lan-
guage philosophy - are instructive in this regard. Both paid closer attention to the history
of language and conceptual change than did most of the philosophers who followed, as
they thought, in their masters' footsteps. Wittgenstein, like his forebears Karl Kraus and
Heinrich Hertz, had an acute appreciation of the historical variability and mutability of
linguistic meaning. Every concept is the repository of earlier associations and uses. As pte-
vious meanings recede into the background, new ones take their place. By way of illustra-
tion Wittgenstein invites us to consider The concept of a "Festivity". We connect it with
merry making; in another age it may have been connected with fear and dread. What we
call "wit" and "humour" doubtless did not exist in other ages. And both are constantly
changing. ',j
76 HISTORYOf CO"CEI'TS
Austin makes a similar point, albeit in a rather different way. Our concepts have histo-
ries, he says, and come to us with 'trailing clouds of etymology'. These are the traces left by
earlier speakers who have worked and reworked our language, extending its range and
pushing irs limits by drawing new distinctions, invoking new metaphors and minting new
terms. The language we now speak is the result of the most long-lived and successful of
those earlier attempts at conceptual revision; it 'embodies all the distinctions men have
found worth drawing, and connections they have found worth marking, in the lifetimes of
many generations'.' AUHin was widely read - or rather, I suspect, mis-read - as an advocate
of conceprua] clarification simpliciter, and a hidebound conservative who held that our lan-
guage is already well-nigh perfect and in no need offurther revision. If so, he (or at any rate
those who read him in this light) makes the same mistake that Marx ascribed to the politi-
cal economists of his day - the mistake, that is, of assuming that there once was history, but
there is no longer any.
Now, however, there arc indicarions that the linguistic rum is at last being completed. A
static and a-historical view is giving way amongst Angle-American philosophers to a more
historical approach to the study of language, and in particular, the languages of political
theory. There is now a noticeable move away from the static and a-historical enterprise of
'conceptual analysis' to a more dynamic and historically oriented emphasis on conceptual
change and the construction of conceptual histories.
Approaches to Conceptual History
The two main approaches to conceptual history have proceeded along parallel tracks. On
one track is the modern German genre known as Begriffigeschichte; on the other, Anglo-
American 'conceptual history' or what I call 'critical conceptual history'." Let me offer, by
way of introduction to these two approaches, a broad-brush and somewhat crude charac-
rerization of each.
Reinharr Koselleck, arguably the leading defender and practitioner of Begriffigeschichte,
observes that 'without common concepts there is no society, and above all, no political field
of action'. But which concepts are to be the common coin of discourse becomes, at crucial
historical junctures, a veritable field of battle. 'The struggle over the "correct" concepts',
says Koselleck, 'becomes socially and politically explosive'." The conceptual historian at-
tempts to map the minefield, as it were, by examining the various historical turning-points
or watersheds in the history of the concepts constituting modern political discourse. This
involves not only noting when and for what purposes new and now-familiar words were
coined - ideology, industrialism, liberalism, conservatism, socialism and altruism, amongst
many others, bur tracing the changes in the meaning of older terms such as 'constitution'
and 'revolution'. This is just the task outlined and given theoretical justification by
Koselleck and undertaken in painstaking detail by the contributors to the massive
Geschichtliche Grundbegriffi, the Handbuch politische-sozialer Grundbegriffi in Frankreich
1680-1820, and other works."
German conceptual historians have attempted to test a number of hypotheses. One is
that the eighteenth century was a period of unprecedented conceptual shifts. Another is
CO:<.!CEI'TUAI, HISTOfl.Y AND1I1F HISTORY Of' POUTICAL TIIOU(;Hr 77
that these shifts involved not only the minting of new terms and the reminting of older
ones, but that they point to an increased tendency toward ideological abstractions. Thus
the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries saw the rise of the various 'isms' - social-
Ism, communism, industrialism, etc. - which, by supplying speakers with a new means of
locating themselves in social and political space, actually reconstituted that very space. Po-
litical conflict accordingly became more overtly ideological, more concerned with ques-
tions of principle (or even first principles) than was previously the case. Concepts that had
heretofore had concrete class and geographic referents became free-floating abstractions
about which one could speak in an ostensibly universal voice. 'Rights', for example, ceased
to be the rights of Englishmen and orher national or legal groups, and became instead 'the
rights of man' or, as we are apt to say nowadays, 'human rights'. The studies undertaken by
Koselleck and his colleagues have, on the whole, tended to confirm these conjectures.
I noted earlier that German and Anglo-American conceptions of, and approaches to,
conceptual history proceed along parallel tracks. The metaphor is apt: the definition of par-
allellines is that, however close they come to each other, they never intersect. Anglo-Arncri-
can conceptual historians both resemble and differ from their Continental counterparts in
a number of ways. They are alike in at least two respects. First, both are interested in the
linguistic limitations and political possibilities inherent in historically situated vocabular-
ies. Both are, accordingly, concerned with the linguistic dimensions of political conflict.
Second, neither has an explicit, systematic, and fully worked-our methodology (although
the practitioners of Begriffigesehiehte have perhaps come closer to developing one). But
there the similarities end, and the differences become apparent.
The German conceptual historians have, firstly and unsurprisingly, so far concentrated
their considerable learning largely (though by no means exclusively) on mapping concep-
tual changes in earlier German and French political and philosophical discourse. Their
English-speaking colleagues have focussed almost exclusivelyon the history of anglophone
political discourse. Secondly, the German conceptual historians have employed a lock-step
way of proceeding, have worked collectively, and have attempted to be encyclopaedic in
range and scope. Their English-speaking cousins have for the most pact worked individu-
ally, have subscribed to no single approach or procedure, and have been more selective than
encyclopaedic in their ambitions and choice of concepts.
I cannot, of course, speak authoritatively about anybody's views but my own. In a very
limited way some of my own work amounts, in effect, to a comparative test of several of the
hypotheses about conceptual change advanced by the German conceptual historians. For
example, several of my inquiries in Transforming Political Discourse (1988) suggest that the
eighteenth century was indeed a period of profound and unprecedented conceptual trans-
formation in anglophone political discourse, at least regarding the concepts of 'parry' and
'republic'.') And my interest in conceptual history has as much to do with the present as
with the past. As significant as earlier, and especially eighteenth-century, shifts were, con-
ceptual change is not safelyconfined to the past bur is continuing even as, and because, we
speak. My own view, which may be more a suspicion than a testable hypothesis, is that we
are living through and participating in a period of profound, exhilarating, and in some
78 HISTORY or CONCEPT,
ways deeply disturbing conceptual shifts. I have attempted in my own and in collaborative
works to give voice and substance ro rhis suspicion."
Political Discourse
If we are to take a 'conceptual-historical' approach to the study of political phenomena,
then we need to identify the defining or distinguishing features of political discourse as a
field of investigation. Moreover, we need to be dear about the concepts comprising our
own discourse. Let me begin with the latter, and go on to consider the former.
In referring ro this or that 'language', I do not mean the natural languages analysed by
linguists - Attic Greek, for example, or modern Dutch - bur allude ro what one might at
first cut call a moral or political language. A language of this SOrt includes those 'shared
conceptions of the world, shared manners and values, shared resources and expectations
and procedures for speech and thought' through which 'communities are in fact defined
and constituted'. This is immediately complicated, however, by a second consideration. A
community's language is not a seamless web or a single structurally unified whole but con-
sists instead of a series of sub-languages or idioms which I call discourses.
A 'discourse', as I use the term, is the sub-language spoken in and constitutive of a par-
ticular discipline, domain, sphere or sub-community. Examples of such sub-languages
might include the discourse of economics, oflaw, of medicine, of computer programming,
and a score of other disciplines or domains.
Bur what of politicaldiscourse? Is it merely one discourse amongst many, or does it have
unique distinguishing features of its own? Here matters become much more complicated.
One of the key features of political discourse is to be found in its central tension, which
may be described in the following way. Political discourse is, or at any rate purports to be, a
bridging language, a supra-discourse spanning and connecting the several sub-languages; it
is the language that we supposedly share in our common capacity as citizens, not as speak-
ers of specialized sub-languages. But, at the same time, this linguistic-political ideal is un-
dermined in rwo ways.
First, political discourse borrows from and draws upon more specialized discourses; it is
compounded, as it were, out oflesser languages. When the concepts and metaphors consti-
tuting the discourse of economics, for example - or of computer programming or law or
religion or medicine or any other discipline enter the field of political meanings, they alter
the shape and structure of that field by altering its speakers' terms of discourse. This process
of transgressing - either intentionally or inadvertently - is a prime source of conceptual
change.
Second, political discourse characteristically consists of concepts whose meanings are
not always agreed upon, bur are often heatedly contested by citizen-speakers. The possibil-
ity of communicative breakdown is an ever-present feature, if not indeed a defining charac-
teristic. of political discourse. As de ]ouvenel observes:
The elementary political process is the action of mind upon mind through speech.
Communication by speech completely depends upon the existence in the memories of
OJNCEPTUAI. HISTORY AND THE HISTORY OF POLlTICAI.THOUGHT 79
both parries of a common stock of words to which they attach much the same
meanings.... Even as people belong to the same culture by the use of the same language,
so they belong to the same society by the understanding of the same moral language. As
this common moral language extends, so does society; as it breaks up, so does sociery.!'
Passing this observation through a finer (and less mentalistic) mesh one should add that the
elementary political process is the action of speaker upon speaker about matters of public
or common concern. However, what is and is not 'public' - and therefore presumably po-
litical- is itself a subject of political dispute and argument. Disagreements about the scope
and domain of 'the political' are themselves constitutive features of political discourse.
In aim and aspiration, then, political discourse anticipates agreement and consensus,
even as its speakers disagree amongst themselves. This discursive ideal is as old as Socratic
dialogue and as recent as Habermas' ideal speech situation. That this ideal remains
unrealized in practice has been taken by some political philosophers to be a defect of politi-
cal discourse, or at any rate a flaw attributable to the speakers engaged in it. From this they
conclude that political discourse needs reforming, or at least that certain sorts of speakers
need chastening, either by learning to speak this new language or by being silenced. One of
the aims of my inquiries has been to suggest that the hope of ending such disputes and of
arresting or even reversing conceptual change is misdirected, inasmuch as it rests upon a
misunderstanding of the structure and indeed the very point of political discourse. In fo-
cusing exclusively upon the anticipation of consensus, one grasps only one of the poles of
political life. By grasping the pole of anticipated consensus and playing down conceptual
conflict one denatures political life and the language that makes that life both possible and
necessary. Disagreement, conceptual contestation, the omnipresent threat of communica-
tive breakdown, and the possibility of conceptual change are, as it were, built into the very
structure of political discourse.'?
A number of contemporary political philosophers, following the lead of W.B. Callie,
have attempted to articulate and analyse this feature of political discourse by suggesting
that moral and political concepts are 'essentially contested'.!' A concept is essentially con-
tested if it has no single definition or criterion of application upon which all competent
speakers can agree. For reasons that I have elaborated elsewhere, I do not believe that the
thesis of essential contestability takes us very far in any analytically useful direction." For
to claim that a particular concept is essentially contested, is to take an a-historical view of
the character and function of political concepts. Not all concepts have been, or could be,
contested at all times. Conceptual contestation remains a permanent possibility even
though it is, in practice, actualized only intermittently. The now-ubiquitous disputes about
the meaning of 'democracy', for instance, are of relatively recent vintage, while the once-
heated arguments about 'republic' have cooled considerably since the late eighteenth cen-
tury (indeed they now rage only amongst historians of political thought, and not amongst
political actors or agents)."
We might say, then, that the essential contestability thesis holds true, not as a thesis
about individual concepts, but as a valid generalization about political language as a species
of discourse. The language of political discourse is essentially contestable, hut the concepts
80 H1S'i"(lRYOf'
comprising any political language are contingently contestable. Which concepts are be-
lieved to be worth disputing and revising is more often a political than a philosophical mat-
ter. In some situations it becomes important for political agents to take issue with their op-
ponents' and/or audience's understanding of 'parry' or 'authority' or 'democracy'. Our of
these challenges, or some of rhem anyway, come rhe conceptual changes that comprise the
subject-matter of critical conceptual history.
Critical Conceptual Histories
The task of the critical conceptual historian is to chart changes in the concepts constituting
the discourses of political agents both living and dead. The kinds of questions to be asked
about the transformation of political discourses will typically include the following. How
might one identify or describe these discourses and rhe specific changes made in them?
Which concepns), in particular, had their meanings altered? How and why did rhese
changes come about? Who brought them about, for what reasons, and what rhetorical
strategies did they use?And, not least, what difference did (or does) it make?
These quesrions will often, though nor always, be answered in some part by pointing to
a particular political tradition or, if one prefers, a tradition of discourse. 1(; Examples of such
traditions might include republicanism, liberalism and Marxism, amongsr many others.
And these can in turn be further divided into sub-traditions such as classical and Renais-
sance republicanism, Soviet Marxism, Manchester liberalism, and the like.
Political discourses, and the concepts that constitute them, have histories that can be
arrarively reconstructed in any number of ways. Such histories would show where these
discourses functioned and how they changed. These changes may, moreover, be traced to
the problems perceived by particular (classes of) historical agents in particular political
situations. Conceptual changes are brought about by political agents occupying specific
sites and working under the identifiable linguistic constraints of a particular tradition as it
exists at a particular time. The vocabularies within and upon which these agents work are
to some degree flexible, although not infinitely malleable. They can to some extent trans-
form their language; but, conversely, their language also subtly transforms them, helping to
make them the kinds of creatures they are. The ways in which speakers shape and arc in
turn shaped by their language are the subject-matter of critical conceptual history
Bur - a critic might ask - why speak of concepts instead of words, of'conceptual' change
rather than 'linguistic' change, and of conceptual history rather than linguistic history?'?
And what - my critic might continue - is criticalabout 'critical conceptual histories'?
The first question is easily answered. A political vocabulary consists, not simply of
words, but of concepts. To have a word for X is to be in possession of the concept ofX. Yet
one may possess a concept without having a word to express it. It is, for instance, clear that
Milton knew about, and valued, 'originality', otherwise he would not have thought it im-
portant to try to do 'things unarrempred yet in prose or rhyme'. But although Milton quite
dearly possessed the concept of originality, he had no word with which to express it, for
'originality' did not enter the English language until a century after his death." Much the
same is true of moral and political concepts. For example, the concept of rights long pre-
CONGY'I'UAL HISTORYAND THE 11ISTORY OF I'OUTICAl. THOCCHT 81
dated the word. I" Moreover, the same word can, in different periods, stand for quite differ-
ent concepts. The 'rights' of Englishmen, for example, were quite unlike the 'rights' of man
or the 'human rights' defended or violated by modern regimes. Nor did 'the state', or at any
rate 10 stato, mean for Machiavelli, what it means for US.
211
Nor did 'revolution' mean for
Locke and his contemporaries what it means for LIS. They understood a revolution to be a
coming full circle, a restoration of some earlier uncorrupted condition; we understand it to
be the collective overthrow of an old regime and the creation of an entirely new one. cl
'Corruption' has decidedly different meanings in the discourses of classical republicanism
and modern liberalism."! 'Ideology' was originally, In the eighteenth century, the systematic
scientific study of the origins of ideas; now it refers to a more or less tightly constrained set
of political ideas and ideals." A 'patriot' - nowadays an uncritical supporter of his country's
government - was once one who dared to be an opponent and critic of his government."
These and many other examples suggest that words do not change, but concepts and mean-
ings do. In an important sense, then, words do not have histories but concepts do.
The history of political concepts (or more precisely, concepts deployed in political dis-
course) cannot, however, be narrated apart from the political conflicts in which they figure.
Political concepts are weapons of war, tools of persuasion and legitimation, badges of iden-
tity and solidarity. They are in the thick of partisan battles for 'the hearts and minds of
men' (to reinvoke that old Cold War cliche). To study the history of political concepts is to
revisit old battlefields and reconstruct the positions and strategies of the opposing forces.
What concepts were on this occasion available, for what purposes and with what effeet(s)
were they used? How were their meanings altered in the course of rheir deployment? To put
my point less dramatically, what distinguishes critical conceptual history from philology Ot
etymology is its attention to the political contests and arguments in which concepts appear
and are used to perform particular kinds of actions at particular times and at particular po-
litical sites." Histories of political concepts are, in short, histories of political arguments
and the conceptual contests and disputes on which they turned and to which they gave rise.
This is not, of course, to claim that all political conflicts are (reducible to) linguistic or con-
ceptual contests. Many, though not all, major political conflicts and disagreements are in
part about the 'real' or 'true' meaning of key concepts - 'liberty', 'equality', 'justice', 'rights',
'representation', and many others besides. One need only think, for example, of current de-
bates about multiculrural citizenship, ethnic identity, group rights and representation: do
'rights' properly belong only to individuals, or can they be ascribed to groups according to
ethnicity, gender, and/or sexual preference?These and other questions raised in the modern
mulriculrural minefield are at once 'conceptual' and political.
A second and more complicated matter still remains to be addressed. What, exactly, is
critical about 'critical conceptual histories? Several answers can be given. The first is that
these are histories written with a critical intention of showing that conceptual change is not
only possible but is virtually a defining feature of political discourse. Second, such histories
will, if successful, show how particular political agents became aware of the subtle and
heretofore unrecognized ways in which their discourses had transformed them (and their
contemporaries) before setting about the task of transforming political discourse. Third, a
critical conceptual history shows in some detail how these agents actually transformed the
82 HISTORYOF CO"CEI'TS
discourse of their day. This requires that the historian identify the processes and mecha-
nisms by means of which specific agents brought about particular changes. These include,
pre-erninendy, the discovery, exposure and criticism of ostensible contradictions and
incoherences in dominant discourses, and the arguments and rhetorical stratagems em-
ployed for that critical purpose and for the more positive purpose of constructing an alter-
native discourse." Far from being the domain of detached armchair philosophers, this kind
of critical activity affects the ways in which political agents themselves think and act. What
Alasdair Madntyre says of the role of criticism in changing moral concepts is no less true of
its role in changing political ones:
philosophical inquiry itself plays a pan in changing moral concepts. It is not that we
have first a straightforward history of moral concepts and then a separate and secondary
history of philosophical comment. For to analyze a concept philosophically may often
be to assist in its transformation by suggesting that it needs revision, or that it is
discredited in some way. Philosophy leaves everything as it is - except concepts. And
since to possess a concept involves behaving or being able to behave in certain ways in
certain circumstances, ro alter concepts, whether by modifying exisring concepts or by
making new concepts available or by destroying old ones, is to alter behavior. A history
which takes this point seriously, which is concerned with the role of philosophy in
relation to actual conduct, cannot be philosophically neutral."
Nor, by the same token, can conceptual histories be politically neutral. This is not to say
that they are necessarily partisan in any narrow sense, but rather that they are critical, inas-
much as they alert their audience to the ways in which and the means by which their com-
municatively constituted world has transformed them and how they in their turn may yet
transform it.
Political Agency and Conceptual Change
r want to conclude by suggesting some of the ways in which an emphasis on conceptual
change might bear upon the way we narrate and understand the history of political
thought. In particular, I want to suggest that a focus on conceptual change does not require
a radical refocusing of the historian's attention, although it does entail more careful atten-
tion to the conceptual character of much political conflict. And I want to insist that atten-
tion to conceptual conflicts and innovations does not - pacesome meta-sciencific 'realists'
and postmodern 'discourse rheorisrs'" - require that we eschew political agency or inten-
tionality; quite the contrary.
Perhaps the most important point to note is that a focus on conceptual change is not
tantamount ro a Copernican Revolution in the hisroriograpby of political thought. It is bur
one lens through which to re-view and perchance revise the history of political thought. It
helps one to become aware of things that might otherwise be overlooked. In particular,
'conceptual histories' highlight the languages - the concepts and categories, the metaphors
(:ONCEI'TUAI. HIWORI' AND THE HISTORY OF l'OlITI(:AI. TH()l.'CHT 83
and rhetorical stratagems - in which political problems are framed, discussed, debated, and
sometimes even resolved, by partisans of various stripes.
Asecond feature is the truism that political actions (including those that alter or extend
the meanings of political concepts) are intentional - that is, they are attempts to dosome-
thing, to make something happen, to bring something about. But a recurring - and argu-
ably a defining - feature of human action is that actions often misfire, producing conse-
quences unforeseen, perhaps even unforeseeable, by the acrorfs) themselves. That
purposive political actions can, and typically do, produce unintended consequences need
not pose any grave difficulty for an approach that views conceptual change as a product of
intentional human action or activity. To appreciate just how and why this might be so, let
us look outside the immediate purview of political theory.
Suppose I arrive home late one evening. Entering my house, I flip the light switch and
several things happen. The light comes on, as I intended that it should. But the light's com-
ing on also wakes the cat, alerts a burglar in the adjoining room, annoys a neighbor, causes
the dial in the electric meter to rotate, and raises my electric bill. Flipping the switch is my
'basic action'." The light's coming on is my action under an inrentionaiist description: that
is what I was doing, or trying to do, when I flipped the switch. I did not intend, and could
not have intended, to wake the cat or to frighten the burglar, since I was in no position to
know that the cat was asleep or that the burglar lurked in rhe adjoining room. And yet 1
did, i.e. brought about, all these things, not all of which were intended but all of which
were made possible by my acting intentionally.
The performance of a political action - including the act ofwriting a treatise on political
theory - is not unlike flipping the light switch. The basic action of putting pen to paper
can be given an inrenrionalisr description: the author was doing, or attempting to do, a cer-
tain thing - to defend or to criticize royal absolutism, to justify or decry regicide, to pro-
mote or oppose religious toleration, or any number of other things. But an author's action
may well (and typically does) produce unintended consequences. His argument might, for
example, later be used for putposes that the author did nor address, and did not or perhaps
could not have intended, or even foreseen. This truism is not exactly a novel insight. How-
ever, a focus on 'conceptual history' leads us to pay close attention to the concepts used in
constructing that argument, and the linguistic conventions according to which it was con-
structed in the first place, and reinterpreted or reconstructed by later authors and/or audi-
ences. A particular (line of) argument may well be misunderstood (or deliberately ignored)
by later writers who wish to appropriate, extend, or perhaps amend what they took this ear-
lier writer to have been doing. Some of these misunderstandings and/or rank misrepresen-
tations may prove fruitful for other actors with their other, doubtless very different, aims
and agendas. And a focus on conceptual change can bring this into bold relief. An example
might serve to illustrate my point.
Margaret Leslieand joseph Femia have criticized Quentin Skinner for his historicist and
conrexruaiisr critique of 'anachronistic' readings of earlier thinkers.:" Strained analogies,
and even anachronisms, they contend, may, in the hands of an ingenious writer such as
Antonio Gramsci, prove to be politically persuasive when addressed to a certain SOrt of au-
dience. In re-describing the Communist Party as rhe 'modern prince', Gramsci adapted and
84 HISTORY or COro;CEPTS
made creative use of what he took to be Machiavelli's notion of a ruthless and all-powerful
principe" On Gramsci's reading, the communist party, like Machiavellis prince, must be
prepared to use guile, cunning, deceit, and violence to achieve worthy ends. Bysubstituting
'Party' for 'prince', Gramsci was able to adapt Machiavelli's arguments to a more modern
and distinctly different context. That Gramsci's use of Machiavellis text was admittedly
anachronistic is beside the point. For as a political actor Gramsci had, and used, the politi-
cal equivalent of poetic license.
Skinner's contention, in effect, is that no such license is granted to historians of political
thought. They, unlike Gramsci and other political actor-authors, are held to more stringent
scholarly standards. If conceptual historians are to understand the meaning that particular
terms, utterances, claims, and arguments had for certain authors and their audiences then
surely we must, at a minimum, know something about che linguistic conventions of the
day and the political concepts, languages, or idioms available to them, and the changes that
these concepts have undergone in the interim. A critical conceptual historian's reply to
Leslie and Femia would note, inter alia, that the modern concept of the 'political party', as
understood by Gramsci and his audience, was not available to Machiavelli and his contem-
porartes." One might also note that certain key concepts in Machiavelli's vocabulary, such
as ftrtuna, have no place in, and are arguably at odds with, Gramsci's own rather more de-
terministic Marxian framework. To make these observations is of course to rake nothing
away from Gramsci, who wrote not as a scholar, but as a political actor and activist who was
in Skinner's sense an 'innovating ideologist'." Gramsci, in other words, used an existing
and already well-known stock of concepts and images to re-describe and lend legitimacy to
an insritution widely regarded as suspect. An interpretation like Gramsci's may be adjudged
good (innovative, ingenious, path-breaking, persuasive, etc.) on political grounds, even as
it is adjudged deficient on historical or scholarly grounds, and vice-versa.
Political innovation and conceptual change ofren occurs piecemeal and by way of rather
ragged ptocesses. It comes about through debate, dispute, conceptual contestation, parti-
san bickering - little if any of which satisfies the standards of Socratic elenchus or the
Habermasian ideal speech situation IJ1 which 'the forceless force of the better argument'
carries the day." We must remember that political actors, past and present, are apt to fight
dirty by, for example, misrepresenting opponents' views, constructing arguments ad hom-
inem, reasoning anachronistically, and using almost any rhetorical weapon that comes to
hand. And success in such endeavors depends, as often as not, upon one side's skill or sheer
good luck in hitting upon an illuminating image or telling metaphor to make its case per-
suasive or at least palarable.t' It is also important to note rhar such arguments and appeals
must be tailored to the tastes, standards, and outlook of rhe audience at which [hey are
aimed. If a political actor-author fails to take his audience's standards into account, he runs
the grave risk of having his actions viewed as unintelligible and/or illegitimate. Both desid-
erata - intelligibility and legitimacy - are, for political agents, considerations of surpassing
importance. As Skinner notes, 'the problem facing an agent who wishes to legitimate what
he is doing ar the same time as gaining what he wants cannot simply be the instrumental
problem of tailoring his normative language in order to fit his projects. It must in part be
n )N(:EI'I'lJAI, IIISTORY AND TIlE IIISTO]{Y (IF l'(ll,IlICALl'HOU(;H'l" 85
the problem of tailoring his projects in order to fit the available normative Ianguage."
Hence,
however revolutionary the ideologist ... , he will nevertheless be committed, once he
has accepted the need to legitimate his behaviour, to attempting to show that some of
the existing range of favourable evaluarive-descriprive terms can somehow be applied as
apt descriptions of his own apparently untoward actions. Every revolutionary is to [his
extent obliged to march backward into battle.."
Or, if you prefer the idiom of Marx to that of Skinner, political actors do remake their lan-
guage, but they do not transform it just as they please; they alter their concepts under cir-
cumstances directly encountered, given, and inherited from the past."
At the same time, however, a political actor/author - particularly one on whom we (ret-
rospectively) bestow the honorific tide of political theorist - not only does things with lan-
guage, but also to language. His or her actions produce changes (sometimes intended,
sometimes not) in the vocabulary available to his or her audience and to subsequent speak-
ers of the language. Through the use of argument, analogy, metaphor and other means he
or she may be able to alter the language of description and appraisal in certain ways, per-
haps by extending the meaning of a term, or even (though more rarely) by coining a new
one.
The value of conceptual history resides in its sensitizing us TO the conceptual character of
political conflict, TO the terms or concepts contested therein, and the changes wrought as a
result. The most fitting fate for 'conceptual history' is that it will cease to be regarded as an
exotic, distinct, and perhaps optional 'method' or 'approach' to writing the history of po-
litical thought, and will become a standard feature of the way in which historians pay at-
tention and do their work.
86 H)STORY 0)' CONCEPTS
CHAPTER 7
Conceptual History in Context:
Reconstructing the Terminology ofan
Academic Discipline
BERNHARD F. SCHOLZ
Finding arguments in support of an intellectual enterprise like conceptual history would
seem easy enough. In the various strands of the ongoing 'conversation of mankind', to use
Michael Oakeshon's felicitous phrase, I what one may expect to find are continuations,
transformations and adaptations of arguments, followed by disruptions, distortions, and
reductions which, in turn, can be undone by revivals, rediscoveries, and renascences of
strands of conversation. What one is unlikely to encounter, since there is no epistemology
shared by all participants of that conversation through the ages, are caregorial beginnings
and endings like rhose demanded of a good tragedy by Aristotle's l'oaics,2 or instances of
newness or ourdaredness of the sort foisted upon us by the masters of planned obsoles-
cence. Research into the histories of concepts, then, can perhaps best be viewed as a me-
thodical attempt at reflecting on and reconstructing specific strands of that conversation.
Problems arise, however, as soon as one attempts to be more specific about the character-
istics of the strands one wishes to reconstruct, or about the relations of those strands to
other strands of the conversation. How are the strands in question to be delineated? In
whose strand of conversation are we going to trace a particular set of concepts? In the
strands associated with particular scientific or scholarly disciplines, and controlled by a par-
ticular social group? Or is an attempt to be made to account for the manner in which a his-
torically delineated social 'life world' as a whole used to converse on a particular topic? Are
the conceprs in question to be culled exclusively from the discourses of particular disci-
plines? Or are they to be gathered from the welter of voices of a 'lifeworld'? Are the con-
cepts in question to be understood as objects named by [he terms of a discipline-specific
terminological repertoire, objects, that is, which have themselves been 'defined' and 'differ-
entiated' in the process of being associated with the terms of such a reperroire?' Or are they
to be understood as objects named by the expressions of everyday language, prior to any
methodological defining and disciplining of that language? Questions such as these are
rarely if ever raised in the programmatic literature on rhe history of concepts. Instead, the
onset of methodological reflection on the possibility of conceptual history tends to be a
point at which these questions have already been answered, in most cases implicitly. Since
my aim in this paper is to argue for the feasibility of a discipline-specific manner of'writing
CONCEPTUALHISTORYIN C:O:-J'rr.X"f 87
conceptual history', rather than [0 take the justification of such an approach to conceptual
history for granted, I shall begin with a brief discussion of the principal options open to the
historian of concepts, which are implied in these questions. I shall then discuss some of the
salient characteristics of a discipline-specific version of conceptual history. And I shall con-
clude with a presentation and discussion of a lemma from a forthcoming dictionary of lit-
erary terms and concepts.
Strands of Conversation
Assuming the basic correctness of the view that the gradual emergence of the various natu-
ral and cultural sciences can be described as the results of ongoing processes of functional
differentiation of previously lessdifferentiated lifeworld complexes of action: it would fol-
low that the rerminologies of these sciences, too. can be described in terms of ongoing
processes of functional differentiation, this time of the variants of language utilized in the
everyday lifeworld. The advantage of this view of the emergence of the sciences and their
respective languages for the student of conceptual history lies in the fact that it will allow
him or her to identify the entities the histories of which he wishes to study, the 'concepts' of
his domain of objects, as belonging to one or the other strands of conversation which
emerge as a result of these ongoing processes of differentiation.
Some of these strands, like those of mathematics and physics, will contain highly for-
malized languages. Others, like those of rhe law courts, though not formalized, will be
characterized by the use of strictly defined concepts and highly ritualized forms of expres-
sion. Yet others, like those used in the public and the private domain, will be seen to con-
tain a mix of concepts of varying degree of definition and precision.
In settling on his domain of objects, the student of conceptual history will, trivially
enough, perhaps, focus on one or more of such strands, and he will derive his materials
from the types of text which circulate among the participants of the strand of conversation
in quesrion. In some strands, he will only encounter texts which have been purged as much
as possible of non-apophantic elements; think of the attemprs in the early days of the Royal
Society to expurgate the use of rhetorical tropes from the papers published in its proceed-
ings.\ In other strands of conversation, by contrast, like those of the public sphere of poli-
tics, he will find rexrs which make it plausible to distinguish, as Koselleck does, between
the Erfthrungsgehalt (experiential content) and the Erioartunosraum (expecrational space)
of a concept." Clearly that would be a highly implausible thing to do with the concepts en-
countered in the texts of strands of conversation which characterize the empirical natural
sciences.
The point I am trying to make about the need to Opt for one or the other strand of con-
versation, and to be aware of what to expect once that option has been made, will become
dear if we reflect for a rncrnenr on what Reinharr Koselleck, has to say about concepts in
general:
88 HISTORY 01' CONCEPTS
Ein Wart kann nun - im Gebrauch - eindeutig werden. Ein Begriff dagegen mulS
vieldeutig bleiben, urn ein BegrifTsein zu kcnnen. Auch der Bcgriff hafier zwar am
Wart, er ist aber zugleich mehr als ein Wort: Ein Wort wird zum Begriff wenn die Pulle
eines polinsch-sozialen Bedeurungs- und Erfahrungszusammenhanges, in dem und filr
den ein Wort gebraucht wird, insgesamr in das eine Wart eingehr. [...] Ein Won enrhalr
Bedeutungsmoglichkeiten, ein Begriff vereinigt in sich Bedeutungsfulle. Ein Begriff
kann also klar sein, mulS aber vieldeung sein.?
It would be easy enough to be uncharitable and call this a higher form of academic non-
sense. But let us follow Paul Ricoeur's advice and read this passage through the glasses of a
hermeneurics aimed at a recollection of meaning rather than an exercise of suspicion.'
What Koselleck is describing is clearly not the manner in which concepts function in the
strands of conversation which are characteristic of the cultural sciences where terminologi-
cal precision is of the essence. He is not even describing - one hopes - the use of concepts
in his own field of research, Begriffigeschichte. What he is giving us instead is a very ad-
equate description of the manner in which concepts (and words) circulate in the strand of
conversation which serves in the construction and maintenance the social reality of the
lifeworld." The Begri./fi to which Koselleck is referring in this passage are clearly not the ob-
jects named by terms occurring in the strictly apophanric texts of the sciences. They are the
mental correlates of expressions which are to be encountered in pamphlets, tracts and trea-
tises, newspapers and periodicals, in edicts and governmental decrees and proclamations,
hansards and official bulletins, on posters, in diaries and in private correspondences and
other types of texts not subject to the constraints ofscientific methodology. They represent,
furthermore, the propositional content of a large variety of speech acts ranging from con-
tracts to promises to orders to statements. Moreover, they represent the prepositional con-
tent of those speech acts not in uitrio, so to speak, de-contexrualized, but in situ, with the
illocucional and perlocurional characteristics of those speech acts firmly attaching to the
concepts. Hence rhe justification to speak of the Erfizhrungsgehalt (experiential content)
and the Erwartungsraum (expectational space) of a concept, notions which, as I mentioned
before, would sound odd if attached to the concepts to be encountered in other strands of
conversation.
Conceptual history as a scholarly discpline, then, I would suggest, has to settle explicitly
on one or mote of [he strands of conversation of a particular [ifewotld, and it must try to
consciously adapt its analytical tools to the manner in which 'concepts', and the 'words'
naming them, circulate in the strandfs] in question.
Disciplinary Architectonics
Begri}figeschichte is sometimes thought of as a discipline in its own right which, in turn,
may contribute to more broadly delineated fields of study like inrellecrual or cultural his-
tory, social history, the history of mentalities, or the history of philosophy." It then func-
tions, as it were, as a means towards realizing the ends of those other disciplines, and it can
subsequently be assigned a place among the elements of what one might call an
CONCEPTUAL HIYl'ORY IN O T ~ X T 89
archirecronic of the cultural sciences based on means-ends relations between diverse disci-
plines. Let us call this a teleologically-based architectonic. 1I
Apparently, however, an acknowledged place in an archirecronic of the cultural sciences
of the means-towards-ends type does not provide the practice of Begri/figeJchichte with a
sufficiently clear notion about how to proceed with tracing the history of a particular con-
cept, nor does it supply the criteria which are needed in deciding which concepts to focus
on. Not surprisingly, therefore, programmatic statements and theoretical reflections on
Begri/figesd7lchte frequently involve discussions of what one might call flanking concepts
like WirkungJgnchlChtcand Problemeescbicbte. concepts, that is, which, rather than identify-
ing the place of Begri}jsgnchichte in the architectonic of the cultural sciences, arc intended
to help the practitioner of conceptual history to decide on how to organize the narrative of
the history of a particular concept. To these flanking concepts has to be added the concept
of 'Crundbegriff" which, as the metaphor already suggests, is meant to lead to a manage-
able selection of [oundational concepts which play, or at some time used to play, a signifi-
cant role in the construction and maintenance of social-political realiry" Wirkungs-
geschichte and Probfemgeschichte, in tact, are also thought to play a role in serrling on those
'Crundoegriffe' whose story needs to be told. In that case their role is one of helping to
identify the 'Sitz im Leben", the life-span, of the concepts selected as 'Crundbegnffe'.
When Wirkllngsgeschichte is used as a flanking concept the goal is not only to ward off the
'Naivitat des (..) Hisrorismus' (the naivete of historicism) which, according to Gadamer,
consists in overlooking the historicity of one's own understanding.1.\ In conjunction with
the concept of the 'fusion of horizons' (Horizontverschmelzung) it serves to identify the
horizon within which the selection of foundational concepts is to be made by assisting the
practitioner of conceptual history in the effort of what Gadamer called the 'Gewinnen der
rechten Prage',11 arriving, that is, at the proper question. Arriving at that question is obvi-
ously all-important in a hermeneutics modelled, as Gadamer's is, on the interplay of ques-
tion and answer.
When Problemgeschichte is used as a flanking concept, a similar tapering off of the stream
of concepts calling for investigation is what is hoped for. Thus when Erich Rothacker in the
Gefeitwort to the first volume of the Arcbiu[iir BegrijJsgeschichte, which he had founded,
drew attention to the 'vielschichrige Verwickelung van l'robfemgeschichte und
Terminofogiegeschichte', I., (the many-layered interrelatedness of the history of problems and
the history of terminology) the purpose was, one feels, not only ro point out that both
types of history were in fact inextricably interwoven. It was also to tie the study of the his-
tory of terminology to the history of problems worth investigating.
What has been said of the role assigned to Wirkllngsgeschichte thus also applies, cetcris
paribus, to Problemgeschlchte. In both cases the 'other' history, 1X1irkungsgeschichte or
Probtemgeschichte. allows for mooring conceptual history in the present, or at least in a
present, and for linking it up with the interests of a present life world. The historian focus-
ing his gazeon rhe longlle dllrfewill undoubtedly be able to identify a number of periods in
history which would qualify as periods of major conceptual change, as Saneiaitcn. that is,
in the sense in which Reinhart Koselleck uses that term. Conceptual history by itself, it can
be argued, does not and cannot possess a criterion for selecting a particular Sattelzeitfor ur-
90 HISTORY OF CONCH'!""
gent consideration. So the decision to focus on the period between 1750 and 1850 as the
Sattelzeitpar excellence to be investigated must derive its plausibility from elsewhere, and it
undoubtedly does so from our awareness that as the theory of Wirkungsgeschichte suggests
- the results of the semantic shifts which rook place during that period still inform our cur-
rent social and political discourse.
With the employment of either flanking concept in conjunction with Begri/figeschichte,
the unity of the stories told by Begri/figeschichte is largely secured from the vantage point of
the stories told by other types ofhistoriography. Wirkungsgeschichte, Reiner Wiehl has sug-
gested, is needed to provide the 'Einheitsbedingung', i.e. the condition for the possibility of
unity for Begriffigeschichte.
'6
Wieh!, although he made a point of stressing the fact that sto-
nes with beginnings and endings were told in the writing of Begri/figeschichte, did nor at-
tempt to follow up the narratological implications of his observations on the unifying role
of Wirkungsgeschichte. Concepts, it can be argued, are usually first introduced or - if we de-
cide to continue the use of concepts already in use - re-explicated at moments of problem
shifts." Looked at from the point of view of those problem shifts their introduction or
their re-explication are thus secondary events which depend on the events taking place
which will prompt their occurrence. Narraroiogically speaking, they are therefore not
themselves suited to serve as agents of the stories which conceptual history wishes to rell."
So it could be argued with some justification that conceptual history, in focusing attention
exclusively on concepts and conceptual change, rather than on the problems and problem
shifts in whose wake these follow, is always in danger of hypostatizing concepts into agents
of the changes of events in which they only participate. Ir is always in danger, that is to say,
of inadvertently adopting an idealist stance. Seen in this light, the turning towards
Wirkungsgeschichte and Problemgeschichte as flanking concepts, but also the frequent calls
for linking up Begriffigesc/nchtewith social history can be understood as attempts at shifting
agency in the stories which are to be told back to where it used to rest before the institu-
tionalization of conceptual history as a near-autonomous discipline.
It should be stressed at this point that assigning a place to conceptual history in the
archirectonic of the cultural sciences is not just a matter of presenting the findings of con-
ceptual history in context. The pivotal concept of this archircctonic, the concept, in fact,
which calls up the need to locate conceptual history in an archtitecronics of this kind in the
first place is that of agency. Ifindeed, as Rainer Wiehl has suggested, stories with beginnings
and endings are to be told by conceptual history, those stories (in the sense of'recitof nar-
rative theory) reqUIre identifying the agems of the histories (in the sense of The
crucial question to be answered in conjunction with this type of architectonic will therefore
be, where to locate the principal agency, how, in other words, to conceive of the
nrchirecronic in causal terms. Settling on an archirectonics for conceptual history, and, in
doing so, settling on an answer to the question of agency will therefore always involve an
ontological commitment on the part of the practitioner. Writing conceptual history from a
materialist perspective will involve a different commitment from writing it from a
wirkungsgeschichtlich perspective in the sense in which Gadamcr uses that rerm," from an
outright idealist or from - so far a desideratum only - a systems-theoretical one. In each
case a different set of causal relations will be claimed to hold between elements of the
U1N(:Fl'TU.'d. HISTORY IN C.Ol\TEXT 91
realms of objects of the various discourses in the architecronic. The archirccronic in ques-
tion thus owes its salient characteristic shape to the perception on the part of the practi-
tioners of conceptual history that an adequate representation of the history of a concept or
a set of concepts requires caking certain causal relations into account. Let us therefore call
this second type of archirectonic, which places conceptual history in the context of endeav-
ours such as Wirkungsgeschichteand Problemgeschichte, 'causally based'."
It will have been noted that disciplines like semasiology, onomasiology, but also
Sachgerchichte (history of the subject matter denoted) have not been mentioned so far in
our discussion of the place of conceptual history in either a means-towards-ends
archircctonic or a causally based one. The reason for treating them separately is that in re-
lating the realms of objects of these disciplines - i.e. words, terms, and objects referred to-
to the realm of objects of conceptual history - i.e. concepts undergoing change - we are
dealing with semiotic rather than causal relations or means-towards-ends relations. We can
therefore identify a third architectonic in which conceptual history can find a place, this
time a 'semiorically based one'. The pivotal concept of this type of architectonic, at least if
we wish to subscribe to the doctrine of the arbitrariness of the sign, is in this case neither
'means/ends' nor 'agency', but 'convention'.
The relations holding in this semiotically based archicecronic arc the ones familiar from
the semiotic triangle, i.e. the referential relations - one usually speaks of a single triadic re-
lation - which bind together sign, concept and 'significaeum'Y No explicit or implicit on-
tological commitment of the kind which characterized the causally based archirecronic is
required of the practitioner of the history of concepts with regard to this triadic relation,
unless, naturally, one wishes to view both the arbitrariness thesis and the nominalist orien-
tation of modern science as intrinsically involving a commitment of this sort.
Opting fora Strand of Conversation, Opting for a Disciplinary
Architectonic
Having distinguished between a number of strands of conversation and between several
kinds of disciplinary archirecronics as options of doing conceptual history, we now need to
say something about the (temporal) relation between these two types of options. In most
cases, one imagines, the decision about the strand of conversation comes first, and the deci-
sion regarding the relevant types of disciplinary archirectonics follow from that original de-
crsron.
The decision to write checonceptual history of a specific scientific discipline rather than
of an unregulated strand of conversation of the lifeworld can illustrate this point. The do-
main of objects to be studied along conceptual historical lines is in this case made up of the
terms and concepts of the scientific discipline in question; terms and concepts understood
in the narrow sense of explicitly agreed on elements which together constitute the termino-
logical and conceptual repertoire of the discipline in question. What is not of interest are-
possibly related - expressions and ideas which ate encountered in a variety of 'life-world'
texts and contexts. In order to become suitable elements of the terminological and concep-
tual repertoire the terms and concepts in question had to undergo processes of definition,
92 HISTORYOF CONCEI'TS
explication and abstraction, processes which, among other things, had the explicit purpose
of making them concexr-invarianr." For the historian of concepts concerned with a disci-
pline-specific variant of conceptual history, that nor only means that the corpus of texts
from which concepts are to be culled is strictly defined: only texts which contain the con-
text-free variants of terms and concepts need to be considered. It also means that he will be
justified in directing his attention first and foremost to those moments in the history of a
concept when the above-mentioned triadic relation of sign (term) concept and
'significarum' was first explicitly established in connection with an attempt at defining a
concept, and then again to moments when that relation underwent changes in the context
of efforts at re-explication and re-definition. The primary focus of an historical concern
with the repertoire of a particular scientific discipline will therefore be on the relations with
the other histories specified by the semiotically-based archirectonic rather than with those
specified by the causally based one or by the archirecronic based on means-end-relations. ,-1
Lexicographical Conceptual History
Having located conceptual history in relation to several strands of conversation, and having
indicated the various disciplinary architectonics of the cultural sciences to which it can be
assigned, we can now turn to the specific variant of conceptual history referred to in the ti-
tle of this paper. It is the variant of conceptual history which is practised by lexicographers
of various stripes who have taken it upon themselves to reconstruct the historical develop-
ment of the conceptual and terminological apparatus of one of the cultural sciences, and of
presenting their findings in lexical order. In our case, it is the lexicographical ordering of
the terminological repertoire of literary scholarship.
There are a number of significant differences with non-lexicographical forms of concep-
tual history which follow from this intended use. First, there is no possibility of recourse to
the notion of Grundbegri./fias a criterion for the selection of concepts whose histories are to
be traced. Nor is there a need for such a notion since comprehensiveness rather than moti-
vated selectivity is what is expected of the lexicographer. But there is now also no possibility
- no plausible need to do so either - of writing the story of a set of concepts in the shadow
of Wirkungsgeschichte or under the guidance of Problemgeschichte, nor is there a need to
identify a particular period of conceptual shift as the Setteleeitto be focused on. What is
called for instead is as comprehensive as possible an attempt at tracing the histories of the
various elements of a terminological repertoire, regardless of whether a particular term re-
fers to a literary genre or mode which is currently productive or to one which ceased being
productive long ago.
Nomenclature and Terminology in the Narrow Sense
The terminological repertoire of literary scholarship is not a homogeneous toraliry" There
are several reasons for this. One has to do with the fact that the elements of that repertoire
have accumulated during different phases of the development of that discipline; another
CONCEPTUAL HISTORY I" CON"fEXT 93
with the fact that a great number of different schools and approaches have been and are still
involved in producing the various items of that repertoire. A third reason, finally, can be
seen in the fact that the elements of that repertoire vary considerably in status. Thus there
are at one extreme of a scale expressions which are not tied to any particular conceptual
framework, paradigm or school. Such expressions are commonly used as general names for
the items which make up the realm of objects of the discipline in question. Typical exam-
ples of this group of expressions are familiar terms like 'tragedy' or sonnet, 'iambic pentam-
eter' or 'trochee', 'metaphor' or 'metonymy', 'Romanticism' or 'Symbolism'. All of these are
terms which possess a status which is similar if nor identical to the status of expressions
from everyday language. They can he and frequently are used without reference to specific
attempts at definition and explication. At the other extreme of the scale there are expres-
sions which are tied to specific conceptual frameworks, theories, approaches or paradigms,
and which, as soon as they are used, tend to call up, no matter how vaguely, that original
context of introduction. Typical examples of that group might be 'chronotope' which has a
clear Bakhrian ring to it, diffirance which to friend and foe will call up Derrida's notion of
deconstruction, or clusters of concepts like 'icon', 'index' and 'symbol' which, viewed sepa-
rately, might be subsumed to the first group, but which, if referred to as a group of three,
wil! call up Charles Saunders Peirce's semiotics. In between these extremes there are a
number of intermediate cases, terms like 'myth' or 'plot' which, although they originally
entered the repertolfe as elements of a specific conceptual framework, in this case that of
Aristotle's Poetics, have since left that background behind. Thus we can talk meaningfully
about the plot of a novel without knowing anything of the Poetics. On the other hand, we
may at times wish to recall precisely the Aristotelian COntext of introduction. An occasion
for doing so might arise when we wish to say something about the plot of Brecht's Mother
Courage. The play, we may wish to say, does indeed possess a plot, but not one of the sort
Aristotle had in mind when he defined 'plot' in his Poetics as an imitation of an action that
is one and whole.I!>
Taking up a suggestion by the Polish literary theorist Janusz Slawinski, I shall label the
extremes of the scale the 'nomenclature' and the 'terminology in the narrow sense' of liter-
ary scholarship respectively. Terms like 'plot', 'myth', 'character', but also 'novel' and 'short
story' can then be said to oscillate between the poles of nomenclature and terminology in
the narrow sense. We can always decide whether we want to use them broadly as general
names of elements from the realm of objects of literary scholarship, or narrowly and with
an eye to one or the other of the explications they have received in the course of time.
It is dear that the elements at each extreme of the scale will raise rather differem prob-
lems when we try to write conceptual histories for them. In the case of elements belonging
to terminology in the narrow sense, such a history will have a clear beginning in an identifi-
able text; it will involve a reconstruction of [he original introductory context, i.e. of the
definition or explication of the term in question, and, in case that term was adopted and
adapted by one or more schools of criticism, it may contain references to the subsequent
discussions of the term. But with that, the task of the historian of concepts is done.
The story is quite different for expressions from the nomenclature of a discipline. In this
case there is usually no authoritative first definition or explication which would mark the
94 IIIST(lRY COt\(:EI'TS
moment of introduction into the repertoire. Instead, there is often a gradual development
to be noted in the course of which the expression moves from everyday language into the
terminological repertoire. But that is usually not a development which will cut the link be-
tween the expression in question and everyday language. Think of 'text', 'image', 'recogni-
tion', 'catastrophe', to name but a few. Terms such as these retain some of the signifying po-
tential of everyday language even when they have entered into the nomenclature of literary
scholarship. In fact it is largely thanks to this link between everyday language and nomen-
clature that literary scholars and art historians on the one hand, and the 'common' reader
and the 'common' lisrener on the other can continue to communicate in a way which
would probably not be possible for the physicist and the 'common' arsonist, or the chemist
and the 'common' substance user.
For the student of the history of concepts, it hardly needs stressing, the real problems
begin when he or she sets out to trace the conceptual history of an element of the termino-
logical repertoire which falls under the heading of nomenclature, rather than terminology
proper. For now not only one or more definitions and explications of the term under con-
sideration will have to be considered, but ideally also the history of the everyday use of that
term, its onomasiological and its semasiological history as an element of everyday language.
Having distinguished the two extremes of the scale on which the elements of the termi-
nological repertoire of a discipline like literary scholarship can be arranged, I need to say a
few words about the items which are denoted by the various items of the terminological
repertoire. Winnie the Pooh, it will be recalled, lived in a house 'under the name of
"Saunders", and in the picture which accompanies that information in the illustrated edi-
tion of A.A. Milne's classic, we actually see him sitting under a board on which the name
'Saunders' has been painted. The contingent relationship between name and object named
which one may find exemplified by Pooh Bear's living 'under the name of Saunders' is char-
acteristic, I believe, of a rather large number of the elements of the terminological reper-
toire of literary scholarship. The corpus of artifacts which makes up the primary realm of
objects is an ever-expanding open set in which some types of text STOpped being productive
at some point in the past, while others have continued to remain productive through the
ages, with new variants added sporadically, and still other completely new genres coming
into existence not infrequently.
To the non-homogeneous terminological inventory thus corresponds an equally non-
homogeneous realm of objects. The Linnean ideal of a taxonomic nomenclature is there-
fore dearly out of reach since at no point is it possible to claim that more than a tiny seg-
ment of the realm of objects is standing in a one-TO-one relation with the items of the rep-
ertoire which are meant to denote it. The terminology of merrics may come close to the
Linnean ideal, while the terminology of lirerary genres is incorrigibly fuzzy due to the fact
chat there will always he texts which can be subsumed under more than one genre term.
From this it follows that as far as the disciplines devoted to the study of literature and
the arts are concerned, the history of concepts must be supplemented by the history of the
objects to which the terms of the repertoire refer. The conceptual history of a concept, that
is to say, has to be supplemented by the corresponding Sacbgescbicbte, and there has to be
an awareness by the practitioners of either type of historiography that there may be corn-
CONCEPTUAL 1llSTORY IN CONTEXT 95
merce in both directions. Shifts in direction in the history of a particular concept may be
due to the emergence of new variants in the textual corpus which need to be accounted for
conceptually. Shifts in direction in a particular Sachgeschichte may be due to changes in the
manner in which a term is explicated with the advent of a new conceptual framework. The
first type of commerce, that from Sachgeschichte to Begriffigeschichte, is characteristically in-
stanced by the advent of bourgeois drama in the l Brh century which necessitated a re-ex-
plication in non-Aristotelian terms of such rerminological items as 'character", 'thought',
even 'unity of plot'. The second type of commerce, that from Begriffigeschichte to
Sachgeschichte is instanced every time a literary programme for a future shape of literature is
formulated and carried Out by a group of writers.
The Programme of the New Reallexikon der Deutschen
Literaturwissenschaft
In what follows ! shall first say something about the kind of items included in the
Reallexikon, then something about the organization of each lemma, and I shall conclude by
way of example with a brief discussion of one of the lemmata.
According to the programme of the third edition of the Reallexikon 27, each lemma
should consist of four clearly distinguished sections labelled 'explication' [Expl].
Wortgeschichte [WortG] (onomastic history), Begriffigeschichte [BegrG] (concept history),
Sachgeschichte [SachG] (history of subject matter designated by the term in question), and
Forschungsgeschichte [ForschG] (histoty of research).
Of the three discplinary architcctonics of Begri;/figeschichte which we identified earlier
on, it is therefore only the semiotically based one which is assigned a ptogrammatic place in
the new Reallexikon. At first sight that decision may be thought to involve ignoring a large
amount of potentially significant information about the historical development of the no-
menclature and terminology of literary scholarship. Can we ignore the social and political
circumstances under which Russian Formalism developed during the first decades of this
century, and thus the circumstances under which a number of key terms of modern literary
scholarship first entered the repertoire ?28 And can we leave aside the social and political cir-
cumstances under which, at the end of the Second World War, American New Criticism
became the model of progressive literary criticism in the West for more than three decades,
and, in its wake, introduced a whole range of descriptive terms into the terminology of lit-
erary scholarship?"
Objections such as these can suitably be discussed in terms of Kar] R. Popper's familiar
distinction between 'questions offacr' and 'questions of justification or validity', and, in its
wake, the distinction between 'the process of conceiving a new idea, and the methods and
results of examining it logically. ')0 If wc further distinguish Popper's questions of justifica-
tion or validity into questions of logical justification or validity and questions of practical
justification or validity, we end up with three sets of questions which closely correspond to
the three types of disciplinary archicecronic we distinguished earlier on. Focusing on the
causally based architecronic can then be seen to involve raising questions of fact: what were
the circumstances under which a term or concept was first introduced, what were the cir-
96 HISTORY Of COt<:CF.[)]"S
cumstances under which the term or concept in question gained currency? Focusing on the
releologically based architectonic, by contrast, prompts questions of practical justification
or validity, questions, which is what Koselleck touched on when he spoke of the
'expectational space' (Erwartungsraum) opened up by a term: which role did a term, a con-
cept play in the (social) construction of reality?" Focusing on the semiotically based
architecronic, finally, will lead to questions about the logical validity of the terms of the no-
menclature and the terminology in the narrow sense. These will involve issues like the re-
construction of the intension and the extension of a term, or the various definitions it re-
ceived in the course of rime."
It would seem obvious that the three lines of questioning can be pursued independently
of each other. An eventual integration of the results into an overall' institutional' history of
a scholarly discipline is thereby certainly not ruled out.
in the programme under consideration the onomasiological and the semasiological his-
tory of a term/concept arc dealt with under the headings of Wortgeschichte and
Begriffigeschichte respectively, the history of the res denoted by the term in question under
the heading of Sachgeschichte, and the history of research on the res under the heading of
Forschungsgeschichte. 'What emerges from this programmatic use of a serniorically based
architccronic of explication, Wortgeschichte, Begriffigeschichte, Sachgeschichte and
Forschungsgeschichte is something like a system of checks and balances which seems to be at
work when both the terminological repertoire and the realm of objects develop and evolve
side by side. The existence of such a system of checks and balances can be gathered from
the processes by which new types of literary artifacts eventually find a place in the termino-
logical repertoire. I am thinking in this context of concrete poetry or of the gradual disso-
ciation of Modernist and Posrmodemisc texts. It can also be gleaned from the manner in
which false terminological starts are corrected, and terms and explications dropped when
they have turned out to have a fimdamentum in re. A striking example would be the fate of
the concepts of 'generative poetics' and of 'poetic competence' which in the early 1970's
were introduced into the terminological repertoire in an over hasty attempt at importing
certain Chomskyan notions which had been proved successful in linguistics into the study
of literature.
From a theoretical point of view the most interesting question raised by the scheme to
be followed for every lemma is very likely the relation between the explication of a particu-
lar concept and its Begriffigeschichte. As explicated by Carnap and others, _,J an explication
of a concept amounts to a rule-governed construction which aims, among other things, at
entering that concept into a context of other concepts, the precise meaning of which have
already been established. An explication of a concept therefore always involves a given con-
ceptual framework which in turn supplies the criteria for deciding on the adequacy of the
proposed explication. With the formulation of the editors of the Realiexikon: the explica-
tion of the concept in question amounts to an 'Abgrenzung von benachbarren Begriffen'
(distinction from adjacent concepts); it should offer a 'vorscblag zu einem wissenschafrlich
verrretbaren Gebrauch des Wortes' (a proposal for a scientifically/critically justified use of
the expression). The focus of the explication, of the Reallexikon is therefore on the possibil-
ity of using the concepts thus explicated in contemporaty scholarship. In view of the ea-
CONCEPTUAL HISTORY IN CONTEXT 97
cophony of competing schools and approaches which characterizes the contempotary scene
of literary scholarship, the decision as to what is and what is not 'wissenschaftiich
vertrerbar' will undoubtedly involve a certain amount of dogmatism in some eyes. The edi-
tors and authors of the Rea!!exikon have not opted in favour of a specific school of criticism
or a particular approach to literature which is subsequently expected to provide the criteria
for deciding what is 'scientifically acceptable' and what IS not. They have opted instead for
the methodological criteria of contemporary definition and explication theory as has been
developed by Analytical Philosophy.
In theory, at least, this offers the possibility of viewing the Begriffigeschichteof a term and
the concept named by it as a history of past explicarions, each carried out in accordance
with the norms ofwissenschafilich verrretbarer Gebrauch' which were in force at the time.
It remains to be seen, however, whether this possibility can be realized in practice.
A question which might be raised at this point is: why does a field of study like literary
scholarship need a Begriffigeschichte of its terms in the first place? Would it not be sufficient
to produce an explication for each of the items of both the nomenclature and the terminol-
ogy proper of literary scholarship and leave it at that? There are indeed literary scholars, es-
pecially those with a strong affinity with structuralism or semiotics, who would be quite
satisfied if we had at our disposal a set of terms with which to order and analyze systemati-
cally both the literary corpus and the regularities, rules and conventions which come into
play in the production and reception of literature. However, adopting this view would
amount to ignoring the facr that the literary corpus should not only be described in terms
of a simultaneous present of all its elements which might conceivably be accounted for in
terms of one set of systematically interrelated explications. Apart from being described as
system, literature also needs to be viewed under the description of a process. And this proc-
ess is not one governed by law-like regularities. It is a process which gains its direction and
its momentum from an intricate interplay of several strands of discourse which provides
orientation for the production, reception and cognition of literature. Ifwe label the strands
of that discourse 'poetic' and 'aesthetic' and 'noetic' respectively" we can locate all of the
elements of the terminology proper of literary scholarship, and a large number of the ele-
ments of its nomenclature, in various phases of the development of one or the orher of the
strands of that discourse. Each concept then can be understood to contribute to the articu-
lation of a period-specific set of conditions of the possibility of producing, perceiving and
knowing literature.
This way of looking at both the nomenclature and the terminology of literary scholar-
ship does not deny the possibility of providing each and every term with a systematic expli-
cation. Both approaches are in fact complementary, and the set of current explicarions will,
when the process of literature has taken another turn, emerge as yet another phase in the
development of several phases of the multi-stranded discourse on literature.
A Case Study: the Lemma 'Emblem'
Let me illustrate this claim by turning to my last point, the lemma 'Emblem' of the new
edition of the Realiexikon. Rather than going through the whole text which, I fear, would
98 HIYIORYOF CONCr:PTS
be quite boring to the non-specialist, let me focus on the difference between the explication
and the Begriffigerchichte of the term 'Emblem', with only now and then a brief glance at
the history of research on the emblem and the information gathered under the heading of
Sachgeschichre.
The explanation attempts to define the emblem as a type of text, listing, as it does, a
number of features which distinguish it from similar types of text. In doing so it proceeds
roughly along the lines which are familiar from traditional theory of definition: identifying
first the genus, and then the specific differences with related types of text. Here everything
dearly depends on the composition of the set of types of texts with which the emblem is
contrasted: whatever features are ascribed to it are features which it possesses in contrast to
other types of texts in the set. Placed in a different set , the emblem would emerge as pos-
sessing different features. That it possesses the features the explication claims it possesses is
therefore contingent on the contemporary decision which is based on a contemporary
consensus about the most suitable context for discussing the concept of emblem. That con-
sensus, one might put it, articulates the current horizon of expectations regarding the fea-
tures a type of text should possess if the predicate 'emblem' is [Q applied [Q it.
13 AND. AL C. E MBL E M. LIB.
Aliqllid I!llIli proptrr lIidnum m.s1u. LVIII.
RIC1'blb"t torren) olIu,qllJTUmUIU mtt:1I1o.
AITr4 C'TJI !igulirerrr.: fiEtn /Mnu.
HoUle igrrur TDglI iaJ,uclil fibi proxi".. frrri.
l.n8uI PTlcipiJrJlltrJCJ; fijhu 4q"'":
Uti lJItr4,HJud IUlbif IUJ{Utlt lDmrNTIU CIlT.t,
Ne lltibi prorimit.u bitefM/oil fir-t.
le IUlbil'[eu MS lib; lDnfir'd UtI
Jp!. cgt/ te fr.grlM fofPire[ou lrrar.
FIGURE 1 Emblem from Andreas Alciatus, Emblematum libellus, Paris 1542
CONCEPTUAL HISTORY IN CONTEXT 99
Significantly that consensus has changed considerably since 153l when Alciaro's
Emblematum iiber, the first emblem book was published by the Augsburg printer Heinrich
Steiner. I've written elsewhere about the details of the circumstances under which that pub-
lication took place. 1, Only one POlllt needs to be mentioned in conjunction with the ques-
tion of the relation between an explication and a Begriffigeschichte of the concept of em-
blem. 'When the first copies of the Emblematum liberreached their first readers, learned hu-
manist friends of A1ciato, none of the three strands of the discourse mentioned above was
established for this type of combination of word and image. A1ciato himself thought he had
written a book of epigrams in the tradition of the Anthologia Graeca, to which Heinrich
Steiner, the Augsburg printer, had - for commercial rather than aesthetic reasons - added a
number of woodcuts. For Alciaro Emblematawas the title of a book of epigrams; the ex-
pression 'emblema' thus functioned as a proper name rather rhan a term. The
Begriffigeschichte of the concept of emblem thus begins with a shift of an expression from
the category of proper name to the category of general term. And that shift took place
when subsequent readers and imitators began to view [he woodcuts supplied by Heinrich
Sreiner not as contingent illustrations, but as obligatory elements of a new type of text. An
explication of 'emblema' in 1531 would have yielded something like 'type of mosaic', 'in-
laid work'. However, it would not have involved as a genus a type of literary text in relation
to which the emblem could have been viewed as one of the species. When the caregorial
shift had taken place by the end of the l orh century, the emblem was firmly established as a
literary genre which called up certain expectations as far as the features were concerned
which a word-image text had to possess if it were to be considered an emblem.
The Begriffigeschichte of the term 'emblem', then, must trace the shift of the expression
'ernblema' from the categoty of proper name to the category of general rerru, and subse-
quently the series of explicacions which that term received as the corpus of texts associated
with it grew in the course of some two and a half centuries. The Sacbgescbichte. in turn, has
to record the stages of the development of the corpus of texts called emblem, and it has to
focus attention on those stages which prompted a re-explication of the term 'emblems'. It
would be a mistake, however, to assume that such re-explications were only prompted by
new variants added to the corpus. Perhaps even more significant are re-explications due to
changes in the choice of conceptual framework adopted fat the explication of the term
'emblema'. The most important of these changes in the period between the first half of the
sixteenth and the second half of the eighteenth century when the emblem genre was pro-
ductive was the shift From an Aristotelian to a Cartesian conceptual framework; a shift, that
is, from an explanation of artifacts in terms of the four Aristotelian causes tcnusa materialis,
causa ejficiens, causa formalis and causa finalis) to a framework which accepted as causal
only one explanation in terms of the causa effidens, and which shifted the focus of attention
from what in Aristotelian terms were second substances to first substances.
Concluding Remarks
The Begrijjsgcschichte of the term 'emblem' is undoubtedly somewhat unusual in that it
provides the student of conceptual history with a view of the inception of a particular con-
100 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
cept. However, it is not unique. The situation is indeed similar to the essay in the rradirion
of Monraigne or the Brcchtian Lelmtuck. Usually the items of nomenclature studied by
conceptual history have, for all practical purposes, always been used, but because of its
somewhat unusual conceptual history the emblem allows us to highlight a few features
which, it would seem to me, are typical of begriffigeschichtlich analyses of concepts from the
disciplines whose domains of objects are made up by the corpora of the various arts.
If Wirkungsgeschichre and/or Problemgeschichte constitute the conditions of unity
l'Einbeirsbedingungen'l of the histories of concepts belonging to the social and the politi-
cal sphere, the unity of histories of concepts from the disciplines devoted to the arts is con-
stituted by the interplay of Sacheescbichtc and what I would like to call the history of the
multi-stranded discourse on the arts. Undoubtedly there are also a few concepts to be
found in the disciplines devoted to the arts which, if their Begrijfsgeschichte were to be writ-
ten, would derive their unity from Wirkungsgeschichre or from Problemgeschichte. One need
only think of concepts like 'art', 'artist', 'poet', 'poem', 'work of art', 'creativity', 'imagina-
tion'. These might even he thought of on a par with the Grundbegriffi of the archirecronic
approach to Begriffigeschichte. However, on closer inspection it turns out that the stories to
be told about concepts such as these do not quite fit in with the rest of the concepts whose
history needs to be understood by the literary historian or the art historian. It is not quite
easy to see why this should be so, but a plausible explanation might be that these are not
really concepts in the strict sense. They are rather much more vaguely delineated concep-
tual units which one might prefer to call 'ideas', and whose history should therefore be
dealt with by the history of ideas rather rhan by conceptual history.
CONCfPTUAI !lIS'l'ORY IN CONTEXT 101
CHAPTER 8
Conceptual History, Social History and
Cultural History: the Test of
'Cosmopolitism'
W1LLEM m l J O ~
Did conceptual history and social history really meet each other? The question may seem
incongruous, indeed paradoxical in the eyes of those who consider the German Handbuch
poiitisch-soeialer Grundbegrifje in Frankreich 1680-1820, initiated by Rolf Reichardr and
Eberhard Schmitt, as an excellent example of the second stage in conceptual history: that of
semantics under the' socio-historical viewpoint. Indeed, in his introduction to this series of
short monographs, published thirteen years ago (1985), Rolf Reichardr declared that the
socio-historical embedding of semantics introduced in this collection had to be considered
as a 'middle course' between lexicornetrics, rejected as excessively synchronistic, hence
unhisrorical, and first generation conceptual history such as Reinhart Koselleck's
Geschicbdiche Grundbegriffi, in which the semantics of historically retrievable concepts
hides in many places behind uncontextualized ideas. In this introductory manifesto, Rolf
Reichardr places the socio-historical foundation of conceptual history in the social charac-
ter of speech itself.I Hence the essentially social origin of meanings, history being the tool
by which the historian tries to get hold of it.
'Social History' and 'Cultural History'
Everything depends, of course, on what one understands by 'social history'. In the light of
the German histoncal debates in the 1970s and '80s, the Handbuch may certainly be con-
sidered a momentous novelty. Indeed, it intends to intimately knot together the semantics
of a concept (i.e. its cultural trajectory) and its social trajectory, not only on the high dis-
cursive level of literature but also in the low-life of street talk. It is rightly assumed that
popular literatute may be as crucial for the development of conceptual meaning as is the
learned reflection of inrellectuai or social elires. However, social history itself has developed
much since the 1980's. From a rather positivist and quanritativisr historical enterprise ob-
sessed with long-term evolurions, processes and structures, the 'objective' existence of
which was taken for granted from the sources, social history has focussed more and more
on the constructed dimension of historical 'reality', on the social mediation of perception
and representation, and on the cultural sedimentation of social reality itself. The question
(:( IN(:IVnJA). HIST()RY. SO(]A). fllSTORY AND CULTURAL HISTORY 103
whether social reality exists independently of the concepts in which it is expressed, is not
really on the research agenda any more - since all historical knowledge is admittedly a par-
ticular form of narrative, and, reversely, narrative is always embedded in social practice.
This is not to say that social history no longer bothers about 'reality', bur it has become
less ingenuous in its approach to the apparent reality of the past. In fact, by now social his-
tory mostly adopts a middle term between positivism and narrativism, and tends to stress
the social, i.e. collectively mediated aspects of the world of culture, the latter to be taken in
the broadest sense of the word, as everything concerned with meaning. The recent discus-
sion in the (former) Annaies. Economies, sociitls, civilisationson the definition of the peri-
odical's scope underlines this socio-cultural turn." In its new title as from volume 49
(1994), Annala. Histoirc. sciences socialcs. the thematic approach of history has been re-
placed by a programmatic confrontation with social theory. However, the meaning of 'so-
cial' theory itself is quite often, and specially so in the Annales tradition, drifting out from
conditions and structures to cognition and culture, to voluntarisrn and symbolism instead
of determinism and materialism.' Even Norben Eliass sociogenetic theory essentially
works with models of cultural behaviour and systems of shared meanings.
Whereas social history was in its first decades essentially concerned with man's activity-
in the way sociology or social anthropology study present societies, it now focusses more
and more on the relationship between human agency and meaning. Such shifting focuses
and boundaries tend to hlur the sub-disciplinary definitions. Some twenty years ago, when
the histoires de> mentalites arose as a cultural alternative to a positivist social history, histori-
ans might have nursed the illusion of a clear division of labour between the two sub-disci-
plines. But soon the definition of bistaires des mentalites itself appeared unclear, since it re-
ferred, according to the historians' position, either to the psychicaldimension of any human
activity, or to the cultural dimension of specific fields of social activity." In the second case,
it embarked, although from a slightly different angle, upon themes and topics which hirh-
erro had been considered the proper territory of social history: the history of power, labour,
kinship, sexuality, communication, social instimtions, etc. In the first case, however,
histoires des mentaiites is not so much a sub-discipline with a proper object, as a particular
methodological approach of the overall historical reality. The linguistic turn of modern
historiography in creating what some historians have called the 'new cultural history' may
have given an appearance of autonomy to this field of research, but it might well be
doubted whether it would be wise to stress autonomous features of 'cultural history'." In
the meantime, bistoira des mentalites and 'cultural history' continue to exist as academic
specialisations. searching for an adequate definition of their somewhat volatile object.
Hence, ever since the very emergence of new forms of cultural history, historians have
suggested that cultural history should not be considered a new sub-discipline but as a spe-
cific approach to social reality, fundamentally embedded In the mainstream of social his-
tory, since culture is the way society expresses itself. Significantly, in their social history of
the french Enlightenment some fifteen years ago Gumbrccht, Reichardt and Schleich pro-
posed a conception of 'social history' in which the psycho-physical structure of man would
be historically integrated. In opposition to the vagueness of the bistoira des mmtaiira con-
cept, they defined the new social history as a history of the historical layers of sensation and
104 HJ.'iT()f/.Y(lfC()r-;(.EPTS
consciousness - Sozialgeschichte als Gescbichte historischer Gefiihls- und Bewusstseinslagen.l'
Since the scope of this contribution is not to summarize a historical discussion but simply
to ask some relevant questions, r would like to limit my argument to guoting Reinhart
Koselleck's exposition of the relationship between social history and conceptual history,
printed elsewhere in this volume." For Koselleck, social history and conceptual history arc
the only two universal forms of historical work, since speech and society are the two poles
of historical understanding: no history without society, no historical knowledge without
conceptualisation. Speech acts express the interaction of concepts and society, but interac-
tion is not identity: linguistic concepts and social 'reality' develop along their own rhythms,
still illuminating each other. In this view, the mutual involvement of both disciplines
would consist of the mutual check of the historical consistency between experience and
language, in the detection of discrepancies in their rhythm of evolution, which would af-
fect meaning, and in the way in which concepts influence society, and the reverse. In fact,
the concept ofreality' has been rightly evacuated from this view, since historical 'reality' is
always conceptualised, narrated history.
Therefore conceptual history bears in itself the promise of being a mediator for bridging
the unacceptable gap between culture - as the expression of society - and society - as the
'reality' side of history. How far did it realize this initial promise to become, both in France
- as a form of historical semantics - and in Germany - as Begriffigeschlchte, the privileged
trait d'anian between social history and histoire des In fact, conceptual history
fell out of step, for in the meantime these two historical sub-disciplines have met each
other elsewhere, in diverse research fields such as cultural anthropology, sociolinguistics
and cultural history, each with their own research agendas, leaving conceptual history
largely aside. Yet in the last ten years several volumes of the Handbuchhave been published.
In other countries, to begin with in the Netherlands, similar research programs have been
initiated. For the outsider, however, conceptual history seems condemned to remain a
specialism in itself, without establishing the necessary alliances with neighbouring research
fields. In France, historical semantics is not far from agonizing. Significantly, the latest
book of one of the most promising young French scholars in this field, Anroine de
Baecque, is not about concepts but about 'metaphors and politics'.
9
In other European countries, it remains, as far as I can see, largely enclosed within the
realm of the history of ideas, abstract concepts, and idioms; without properly achieving the
expected breakthrough towards society as a historical category," The 'new cultural history'
goes its own way by focussing on narrarivism and cultural analysis, on languages and sym-
bols, on models and images, without bothering very much about concepts, the history of
which is at best considered by many as a new variety of the old history of ideas. Peter
Burke'sand Roy Porter's Social history oflanguage (1987) 1I mainly follows the path of socio-
linguistics; and Burke himself balances at present between the history of conversation and
that of silence. The new 'social history', in its turn, following in the footsteps of cultural
anthropology, is much more fascinated by the speech act itself than by what is actually said,
and in what words, or by the political meaning of it. Since 'social history' now seems to re-
turn to a closer attention on group representations and the appropriation of meaning, con-
CONCEPTUAL IlISTORY, sm.IAI. HIST()RY ANn C:Ulnm,Al,H1ST{lR,Y 1CS
ceprual history might be expected to be more warmly welcomed - hut for the time being,
the results are rather meagre.
This picture may, of course, appear too pessimistic to the believers, and I must confess
that my knowledge of what is actually going on all over the world is far from perfect. How-
ever, I am not sure that a closer scrutiny of the recent bibliography gives much hope for a
more optimistic image. The purpose of this shorr contribution to the discussion is to ex-
amine whether the actual practice of conceptual history, as demonstrated in one of the
published case-studies, gives us some clues for a better understanding of this relative lack of
expansion in social history, and perhaps some ideas for remedies as well. I do not adopt a
theoretical viewpoint, since there is barely a want of theoretical contributions in this field. I
prefer a more practical approach, in the form of a short analysis of one of the entries of the
Handbuch. My comment upon this item will result in some questions. Purposely, I have
chosen an entry which is particularly fit for an interrogation of a socio-cultural character,
since the concept under consideration refers both to a cultural attitude and to a social prac-
tice. I mean the words 'cosmopolire' and 'ccsmopoliftilsme', studied in Volume 6 of the
Handbuch by Gerd van den Heuvel, under the general concept of cosmopolnism." Besides,
their semantic field is dose to concepts studied within the framework of the Dutch project,
such as fatherland, patriotism, or freedom. My approach is not meant to be a criticism of
Van den Heuvel's analysis itself, since he only applies the principles fixed for the whole
work. On the contrary, I consider his article an exemplary form of what conceptual history,
as expressed in the introduction to the Handbuch. has to offer. Therefore my comments are
intended to have a more methodical renor.
Cosmopolitism and the Republic of Letters
The entry Cosmopolue, Cosmopoli(ti)sme is rather short - fifteen pages -, which suggests
that its semantic evolution was simple, at least in the French setting. It is subdivided into
seven headings, including a historical introduction. In that introduction, the attention of
the reader is drawn to cosmopolitisrn in the Classical Antiquity and the Renaissance. As for
Antiquity, it is thought to be expressed in the idea of the natural equality of all men in all
the different political entities of the world. During the Renaissance, Erasmus of Rotterdam
and Monraigne. were, of course, the main Interpreters of the ideal of a single political hu-
man brotherhood, fraternizing beyond the fromiers. 'Ego mundi en/is esse CUpID, communis
ommum velperegrmus magis; is one of sentences in which Erasrnus, quoting similar phrases
of Terrullian, Zenobios or Cicero, expresses his detachment from local bonds and claims
his solidarity with a larger, indeed a supranational community Il However, unlike the bibli-
cal metaphor of the heavenly Jerusalem, or Se Augustine's concept of the Civitas Dei, re-
charged with the idea of Chriuianitas during the Middle Ages, the Renaissance concept of a
supranational brotherhood was fundamentally not a religious or an ecclesiastical, but a lay
concept like the Orbis terrarum concordia of Guillaume Posrel (1544).14 It supposed a free
choice of the individuals involved, in favour of humaniry and toleration.
106 HISTORYOF (:ONCEl'TS
The same development of an ecclesiastical into a layconcept may be detected behind the
evolution of other terms fitting within the same concept and indicating a virtually
supranacional community of learning. Since the second half of the fifteenth century, the
'university' became gradually an 'academy', a term which is also used for the learned acad-
emies of scholars. The first university formally founded as an academy was that of
Wittenberg in 1502, which soon developed from a profoundly humanistic enterprise into
the first Reformation university." The two aspects are more closely linked than is generally
thought. Indeed, the humanistic 'academy-concept, straddling the darkness of ecclesiasti-
cal scholasticism, attaches itself to the true form of education in Greek and Latin Antiquity,
which is the free congregation of those engaged in the advancement of learning, including
religion."
It is not dear in the Handhuch entry whether the term 'cosmopolirisme' itself was in use
since Classical Antiquity." The first public use of it in French was, at any rate, by the same
Guillaume Posrel in the title of one of his books published in 1560, or better, in the self-
definition of the author, since he designated himself 'Cuillaume Postel, Cosmopolire'. Sig-
nificantly, the book was about the Turks, and it was not published in the nation's capital
Paris, but in remote provincial Pcitiers. In fact, the word 'cosmopolitan' was used alterna-
tively with that of 'world citizen' (citoyen du monde'). In this literal sense, i.e. the 'cosmo-
politan' as an inhabitant of the world or a member of mankind, he was not limited by
qualities such as national citizenship, During the seventeenth century the term was used in
works of natural philosophy or, more exactly, alchemy. Bur in that context it clearly had a
symbolic meaning: attaching man explicitly to the cosmic order," In the mid-sixteenth
century, Florence's grand duke Cosimo I de' Medici had played with this symbolism when
he created the harbour town of Portoferraio on the isleof Elba, called Cosmopolis. both as a
pun on his own name and to mark its quality as a 'universal city'. I'!
This tradition of cosmological symbolism links the sixteenth-century term 'cosmopoli-
tan' with its reappraisal in the eighteenth centuty, but it is not clear whether - and if so, un-
til what point - such symbolism still permeated eighteenth-century semantics, At any rate,
in a letter written in 1648 Cyrano de Bergerac - the real one - seems to use the term as a
mere cosmographical, ar best a political concept. For him, the bonnae homme is nor a
Frenchman, not a German, not a Spaniard, but 'he is a citizen of the world, and his father-
land is everywhere', This cosmographical concept of a world citizen is gradually filled in
with a greater moral charge. Ever since, the term 'cosmopolire' has seemed to prevail." The
Dictionnaire de Treuato: recorded rhe word as early as 1721, whereas the Dictionnaire de
l'A,cademiefranralse listed It in its 1762 edition, with an explicitly negative moral connota-
tion: 'Cosmopolite-. he who adopts no fatherland' (Acosmopolitan is not a good citizen).
However, cosmopolicism was not only a concept, it was also a way of being. During the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, cosmopolinsm was, for example, rhe main form of
social behaviour in the supranational community of the Republic of Lerrers. In stating this,
Van den Heuvel however remains very cautious as to the truly international character of
this Republic. Especially in France, he argues, national boundaries remained strong, and
rarher few French people rraveled abroad. As for periodiaarion. in Van den Heuvel's opin-
ion the Republic of Letters was above all a matter of the late seventeenth and the early
(:ONCFPTL'AL J-IISTORY. SOl :IAI, HIST(lRY At"l) (:ULrURAI, HlSTC1RY 107
eighteenth century. But even then the enlightened elites of France appear as rather enclosed
within the boundaries of their fatherland, physically and inrellecrually." It is here, however,
that the first real problem arises for the social historian. Then: is in fact no doubt whatso-
ever about the antiquity of the Republic of Letters. Recent research on communication
among early modern educated people clearly shows how precociously the Republic of Let-
ters functioned as a true international network: in fact as early as Erasmus's own
correspondance, in [he first half of the sixteenth century." As for France, learned cosmo-
politans like Guillaume Postel or Francois Hotman, and famous scholars like jacques Cujas
or Jean Bodin, were excellent sixteenth-century examples of network-builders: attracting
foreign students from everywhere, reacting actively to foreign publications, or correspond-
ing with foreign scholars. Friar Marin Mersenne and councillor Nicolas Pabri de Peiresc
have illustrated early seventeenth-century scholarship, whereas the very summit of Leiden
learning, Joseph justus Scaliger from Agcn, wanted to leave his country only after much
insistence and for unheard-of conditions." He brought with him one of the most astonish-
ing networks of correspondents.
Such networks implied for each member of this non-territorial Republic a shared iden-
tity, in fact a multiple solidarity: with his country (expressed, e.g., III the 'nations' of the
universities), with the supranariona] network of the Letters, and with his - mostly also
supranarional-. religion, or religious order. Nevertheless, that network was a social and cul-
tural reality, and more so as the geographical structure of its centre can be described as a
quadrangle going from Rome and Naples in the South, to Amsterdam, Leiden, Oxford and
Cambridge in the North, and from Paris and Lyon in the West, to Gdansk, Leipzig, Prague
and Vienna in the East. Within this quadrangle, were located virtually all the big libraries,
all the manuscript collections, all the really important universities and learned academies;
all the international periodicals were published there, and all the publishers of works of arts
and sciences were active in that region. In fact, the quadrangle functioned as early as
Guillaume Pastel's first self-designarion as a cosmopolitan. Ever since, it has only been
slightly enlarged towards the North (the Dutch Republic) and the East (Berlin).
The point of my observation is however not the very existence of the Republic of the
Letters, but its gradual shift from the use of a supranationallanguage which in its very ex-
istence symbolized the concept of cosmopolitism, to a nationally embedded language, ac-
tively promoted by people from the speakers' nations: i.e. the shift from Latin to French as
the main language of international communication. This change from the language of
Church and religion to a language of national interest facilitated the secularizaoon of the
world of learning, particularly in the rising new science, in medicine and letters. It also
brought new tensions, this time among social groups; since French is the language of po-
liteness, not of middle-class culture. No wonder that even in Protestant countries, it was
among theologians that Latin resisted longest its international erosion. Perhaps this was be-
cause theology was for the unfavourcd classes instrumental to their social emancipation:
the sacred ministry being the best accessible gateway to upward social mobility for the next
generation.
108 11ISTOltYOf' CONCEPTS
Of course, even after the shift [Q French as the language of court, diplomacy, commerce,
and upper-class society life, Latin would still remain for some centuries the official lan-
guage of the universities and hence of a lot of scholarly correspondence. Bur ever since the
first half of the seventeenth century, French was, outside the traditional institutions of cul-
ture, adopted more and more all over Europe as the language of elite behaviour, polite con-
versation, and educated correspondence. This was more so as the Revocation of the Edict
of Nantes in 1685 generated a truly international and very influential network of French
intellectuals In key positions abroad - from Berlin to London and from Holland to Swit-
zerland. Pierre Bayle wrote his seminal Diaionaire historique et critique(1697) in Rotter-
dam in French, and his Nouvelles de la Republique des Lettres (since 1684) were printed in
French by a Dutch editor who served virtually all Europe and did so mainly in the French
language." Everywhere in eighteenth-century Europe, Gallophilia was an upper class dis-
ease ardently combated by the rising nationalism of bourgeois and other educated elites
who found here one of their first causes and through this opposition could learn eo sketch
the first outlines of rheir own political creed."
Hence the question of how the semantic field of cosmopolitism adapted itself to this
new social reality. Especially in this supranational area, the concept of cosmopolitism in its
French version is at least as much tributary of politically foreign, non-French authors as of
indigenous French use. The French language as codified by the Academic Francaise and by
the manuals of fashionable French gem deierira does not adequately reflect its actual riches;
it most probably tends to neglect non-national idiomatic French, and thus to underesti-
mate eventual semantic changes in the concept's appropriation prepared elsewhere, be it -
quite literally - in the margins of the French-speaking world. As far as cosmopolirism is
concerned, French (as a language) is emphatically not identical to France (as a nation). For
the social historian, the equation between the semantic field of the French language on the
one, and the political field of the French nation on the other side, appears therefore as the
first assumption to be questioned.
Secondly and more profoundly, the question is to know whether, from the viewpoint of
social history, the exclusive focus upon the evolution of the concepts and their change in
the eighteenth century does not obscure significant changes in other, previous periods.
There is indeed reason to believeso. One of the very first key periods that comes to mind is
the Renaissance. Indeed, a prior major change in the use of the concept of cosmopolirism is
its virtual secularization in the Renaissance period, since at the same time this involved a
profound individualization. Cosmopolirisrn, or world citizenship, was no longer attached
to a religious or political body like Christianity, bur was related to an individual's behav-
iour, or his state of mind. To put it schemacically: cosmopolinsm was not a given corporate
property any more, but became the questionable result of a personal choice. There was then
the new ability of the concept to express social forms of free association. Cosmopolitism
and world citizenship could now be used as equivalent to the membership of the
supranarional Republic of Letters, which indeed ever since the time of its inventor Erasmus
was idealistically thought of as a free association of educated men all over the civilized
world, without discrimination of birth, religion or social status. Although the Republic of
(:()N(:EPTUAL HISTORY, SUCIAI. HISTORY AND CUlTURAL HISTORY 109
Letters was a soda-cultural reality, only social representation could make it a true expres-
sion of cosmopolitism.
Cosmopolitism, Social Class and Cultural Models
After his introduction, Van den Heuvel subdivides his entry into six headings, each corre-
sponding to a stage in the semantic evolution of the concept of cosmopolirism. In the first
of these six paragraphs, the equation of the cosmopolitan with the Enlightenment philoso-
pher is brought forward. In his self-consciousness, the French pbilosophe pertained indeed
to an international elite, distinguished by reason, and obliged to toleration and humanity,
in order to foster the progress of mankind." Volraire is, of course, the most brilliant repre-
sentative of this self-chosen mission."
For d'Alembert, the hommedelatra was necessarily a 'cosmopolitan author", and the en-
try Cosmopolire in the Encyclopsdie in its 1754 edition, eight years before the Dictionnaire
de i'Academie franraise, still gave a neutral, indeed a positive definition, turned towards the
values of the European elites: 'A cosmopolitan is a man who is a stranger nowhere'. Four
years earlier, the French libertine Louis-Charles Fougerer de Moncbron 0706-1760) had
published the brilliant autobiographical manifesto of the Enlightenment cosmopolitan
abroad, under the title Le Cosmapolite. ou le Citoyen du Monde in which both
terms appear as expressions of the same concept. For Pougerer, the true cosmopolitan is the
man who feels at home everywhere, who enjoys every culture, and whose liberty to join
every single nation is founded upon his absolute individualism, without recognizing any
tribute to social ethics. Fougerec's cosmopolinsm is a variety of radical scepticism and a to-
ken of sovereign independence, but it IS also typically a writer's vision of his time, wrapped
up in the literary metaphors and cultural models of [he eighteenth-century satirist.?" It is
precisely this Enlightenment focus upon the cultural element of the definition, i.e. the cos-
mopolitan as a man of letters who aims at the transfer of his Enlightenment ideals through
knowledge, writing, and education; which reveals the concept's embedding in the long so-
cial history of the European intellectuals. This should of course be handled in the concept's
analysis.
Formally, the French philosophers did not include a political programme aiming at the
abolition of any national state in their cosmopolitan self-definition. More than the state, it
was the stratification of the society of orders, or the social classes, which was the target of
their criticism: cosmopolirism was equivalent to a progressive policy, be it in social matters
or in economics (e.g. physiocracyl. But some clues may certainly suggest a more differenti-
ated approach. Thus, in the mere conceptual Vision of cosmopolitism, as given in the entry
of the Handbuch. the particular position of jean-jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) with re-
gerd to cosmopolitism is attributed to this author's political philosophy." For Rousseau,
cosmopolitism was against human nature, since it was idealistic, and it misjudged the true
needs and interests of man. In his eyes, the cosmopolitan was nothing more than an anti-
social, egotistic being, who replaced authentic commiseration with his neighbour by a uni-
versally extended, but unreal union with mankind, and who was unable to embrace the
cause of his fatherland as a true, patriotic citizen because he did not recognize a fatherland
110 I-lISIORY()fCON(:FPTS
any more. Rousseau's disenchanted ideas on cosmopolitism date from after his rupture
with the Encyclopedists. This benefits us with a socio-cultural clue, pertaining to the order
of social representation, and alternative to the internal evolution of his political ideas, since
Rousseau, as jacques Oerlemans has shown, invested heavily in the social grudge which he
had built up against the social and intellectual elites who did not admit him in their midst
on an equal footing, and which he afterward transformed into a more or less coherent po-
litical philosophy." Out of his own social experience, Rousscau warned in his Emile. ou de
ieducation (1762) against 'ces cosmopoliees qUI vont chercher au loin dans leurs livres les
dcvoirs qu'ils dedaignenr de remplir aurour d'eux. Tel philosophe aime les Tanares, pour
erre dispense d'airner ses voisins'."
Rousseau's image of the cosmopolitan as a friend of the universe but an enemy of his
neighbours was to mark the semantic field of the concept of cosmopolirism for a long time.
In the eyes of politics, the cosmopolitan became an opponent to the fatherland, although
Rousseau, much more than Herder and the German patriots, justifies his patriotic claims
by an appeal to 'universal' properties of the whole of mankind, as expressed in la volonte
generale, 'the general will'."
Up to what point Oerlemans' suggestion that the problem of the frustrated intellectuals
has to be considered responsible for this semantic evolution, remains a point of discussion.
Although in his own eyes perhaps an 'alienated intellectual', Rousseau was not exactly a
Grub Street writer. Again, social representation, not necessarily social reality, is here the
clue for the interaction between the concept and society. As Roberr Damron, Roger
Chattier and others have shown, in France, as well as in England and Germany, and even in
the Netherlands, Grub Street writers and other socially discriminated intellectuals consti-
tuted a particular fertile social class for semantic change in the political idiom."
The last three paragraphs of the Handbuch entry deal precisely with this semantic
change in the early years of the French Revolution. The term 'cosmopolitan' apparently
started by having a rather neutral meaning - i.e. that of an international businessman
tcommercant ct ntgocfam). This neutral sense of a man being above parties echoes in the ti-
tle of a French pamphlet said to have been published in Amsterdam: Le caffi politique
d'Amsterdam, ou entretiens ftmiliers d'un Franrois, d'un Anglois, d'un Hollandois et d'un
Cosmopolite, sur les divers interhs tconomiques et politiques de la France, de I'Espagne et de
l'Angleurre.
1
' But its meaning was easily on the verge of being perverted, since it could ap-
ply to groups perceived as politically homeless (e.g. the international business network of
the Jews). The Revolution itself adopted the concept of 'cosmopolitism' as a means and a
model of diffusing its ideas on universal fraternity, either in the secular field of politics or in
religious matters - the culte cosmopolite of universal reason and morals. It is surely no corn-
cidence that the most exemplary cosmopolitans of the French Revolution were foreigners,
not Frenchmen, i.e. foreigners having adopted French as their idiom and France as their
new homeland. The most picturesque among them was certainly the Cleves baronet
Anacharsis Cloots (1755-1794), an avowed Gallophile of Dutch Catholic origin who pro-
claimed at the same time to be 'the orator of mankind' .li. For him, apparently, patriotism
and universalisrn were not mutually exclusive. It may be supposed that the same applies to
other eighrcentb-cenrury cosmopolitans. J7 The link between the concept of cosmopolirism
(ONUI'I'UAII lISTORY, SOCIAL 11I5TURYANn CUlTURAL HISTORY \ 11
and revolutionary society now runs through the social representation of the baronet's uni-
versal homeland.
Soon, however, idealistic cosmopolitism dashed with the First Republic's need for true
patriotism." The semantic shift has roots in both social conditions and cultural models.
Cloors himself, in spite of his symbolic quality, was the living example of the growing con-
tradiction between unitary patriotism and federativc, or elective, internationalism. In the
same session of the National Assembly where he proposed his Universal Republic of all
Mankind, he was given the French nationality together with seventeen other world citi-
zens. According to Cloots's conceptions, this Universal Republic had to be governed by a
'fraternal government, which is nothing else than a huge central bureau of correspondence
for the official advertisement of all knowledgeable events to the cosmopolitans'. Once
again, the federarive model of the Republic of Letters is obvious. But his enemies were
much more aware of its political implications. Cloots was arrested on the accusation of be-
ing a 'foreign agent' (!), and executed on 24 March 1794.
For the social historian, it is perhaps not so much the semantic opposition of
cosrnopolitism to patriotism which accounts for the negative image, indeed the stigmatiza-
tion with which the cosmopolitans were victimized after 1792, but much more the use of
two cultural models for the perception of the political reality: first the model of centrally
conceived unity as against federarive, necessarily centrifugal association, Implying the op-
position of constraint against freedom. Secondly the model of the good insider as opposed
to the necessarily bad outsider, making common cause with the enemies abroad, and hence
himself a foreign agent. The logic of war reinforced the actual impact of such models. It
stressed their adequacy for a new reading of social relations in a changed political situation.
But the models themselves were quite ancient. They represent traditions in the perception
of social forms which are transmitted through education and embodied in language itself.
A last step in the concept's social evolution was the equation between cosmopolitism
and elite culture, but this time social representation worked negatively. Since the trading
elites, the aristocracy and the ruling classes travelled abroad frequently, either For educa-
tion, for business, or for leisure, elite culture was gradually stigmatized during the French
Revolution as a treacherous form of anti-patriotism, recognizable in cosmopolitan behav-
iour. Foreign, or international culture became equivalent to the treason of cosmopolirism.
Hence, after the Revolution, the reversal of the terms: the real culture, true civilization, was
forcibly supranational, universal. Local culture was mere popular culture, folk culture, still
to be elevated to an intemational level.?" We then see the invention of local anthropology
in the aftermath of the French Revolution, as an instrument for the cultural control of the
nation by the elires." However, the French case is far from unique. The first debates on the
reform of popular culture in the Netherlands in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth
centuries reflect the same convictions, and outline the requisites of a civilising offensive di-
rected toward the lower middle classes or the masses. On close scrutiny, however, even this
equation between popular culture and local culture appears to go back to the great waves of
in-depth Christianization in all the confessions, Catholics and Protestants alike, in the pe-
riod between Humanism and Enlightenment, roughly the late sixteenth and the seven-
teenth centuries. As early as 1679, the French parish priest jean-Baptisre Thiers (1636-
112 HISTORY 01' C O ~ C J I S
1703) of the Le Mans diocese identified in his influential Traire des superstitions, repeatedly
reprinted, superstition as identical to local culture, whereas true religion, hence true cul-
ture, was for him necessarily universal.
Concluding Remarks
It would of course be possible to pursue rhis demonstration and ro show with more appro-
priare examples how semantic changes were rooted in new forms of social representation,
in changing social relations or in the updating of old schemes of perception or cultural
models of social organization. In order to see them, one needs the spectacles of a social or a
cultural historian. Such spectacles imply a proper point of view from where to look at
them, in other words, the proper statement of a new historical problem, or a new alliance
with another discipline. Let me simply draw here some conclusions from the preceeding
considerations.
The first conclusion is not more rhan an impression, but nevertheless a strong impres-
sion. It is that the development of conceptual history as an interlocutor of social history is
hindered by its too close connection with the Satteleeit hypothesis. Conceptual history, in
its German version, focuses all its attention upon the conceptual shifts and their political
implications at rhe cnd of the eighteenth century. It virtually neglects possible shifts of an-
other nature in other periods which may illustrate other semantic properties of the concept
under review. For the relative outsider, which I am, conceptual history tends sometimes to
become a history without surprise, with a prime theory defined once for all, all the rest be-
ing application. In this short analysis of the concept ofccsmopolicism'. ar least, the Renais-
sance too appears ro be a period of great semantic shifts; still other periods may be high-
lighted by further research. It is, at any rate, probable that the limitation of the period
covered to 1820 by the Handbuch is too closely linked with the Sattelzeit hypothesis, and
taken too easily as a ready-made theory. The concept of cosmopolitism was still ro enjoy a
healthy life in France and elsewhere." In international Communism, it would even be
gratified by Stalin with a quite remarkable semantic shift which drove it straight back to the
Terror period in the French Revolution.
As a second conclusion, we may state that what fails more pragmatically, is conrexrual
information other than linguistic, literary, or idiomatic. Who uses which word, where,
when, why, what for, and with which meaning? Images, symbols, objects, status considera-
tion, group behaviour, stratification, and so on, are elements of rhe contextualisarion and
the posirioning of concepts in a field of social or cultural representation, and of social use.
In brief, they are evidence of forms of collective appropriation, which can be illuminating
for a new understanding of conceptual shifrs. Conceprs are necessarily in interaction with
such elements of social 'reality', which rhey constitute as forms of social representation and
elements of historical knowledge. He or she who fails to scrutinize this interplay in the
closest possible way condemns him- or herself to easy misinterpretations.
What seems lacking, thirdly, is a more systematic attention to the perception of the con-
cepts as elements of a world-view, and for the interconnections in time and space between
the words which express them. When studying a particular concept, conceptual history
CONCEPTUAL T ~ T O R Y S(}(:IAI. HISTORY ANO n;LTURAI. HISTORY 113
should always examine equivalent or synonymous terms with similar connotations, the
more so, since ~ y concepts are at the same time current words; and it is very difficult to
make a sharp distinction between a concept and a word. This applies quite clearly to the
concept of cosmopolitism. If we agree that cosmopolitism as a concept is, as in the title of
Fougerer's booklet, semantically equivalent to the term 'world citizen', then we should at
the same time analyse the other term, without forgetting that the word'cosmopolitan' may
have diverging connotations, as, for example, in the case of alchemy. Hence concepts
should not be studied without simultaneously analysing the whole field of connected
terms, both horizontally (the broad semantic field of the concept, encompassing a variety
of words) and vertically (the participation of the same word in virtually diverging semantic
fields or concepts). Studying the concept of cosmopolirism makes no real sense without
analysing, at the same time and with the same thoroughness, the terms, concepts or social
constructs of Christianitas, [he Republic of Letters, or world citizenship; and without for-
getting to confront the results with virtual antonyms such as fatherland or patriotism.
Still, conceptual history should be considered an indispensable tool for social history. It
clarifies the range and depth of the semantic fields involved in cultural and social represen-
tation, at the crossroads between language and society. Social and cultural history, in its
turn, may clarify the stratification of such semantic fields as related to group behaviour,
and illuminate their position in group representations and in the overall world-view of a
given collectiviry, Conceptual history, I would say, is the investigator and the guardian of
the semantic elements of the cognitive reality which social history brings together into a
single, necessarily global picture. That means that social history is not specifically con-
cerned with 'reality', but with the ways in which past societies are explored, analysed and
accounted for as properly historical societies. Its privileged tool for the understanding of
these ways may well be conceptual history. In its turn, conceptual history needs to be
rooted in social evidence if it wants to unearth social meaning. At any rate conceptual his-
tory should not give way to the temptation of all sub-disciplines to constitute itself as an
isolated body of knowledge. When conceptual history is the proper tool of historical
knowledge, it should more than ever try to situate itself at the very center of historical prac-
uce.
114 HIS'IURY Of CONCEPTS
CHAPTER 9
Conceptual History and Conceptual
Transfer. the Case of 'Nation' in
Revolutionary France and Germany
HANs.jORGEN LOSEBRINK
Methodological reflections
Conceptual history - particularly Begriffigeschichte - has been predominantly investigated
within the fields of national languages and cultures, and has been restricted mostly to the
analysis of isolated concepts in rheir historical evolution. The present contribution tries to
overthrow this perspective and to extend the field of conceptual history in a double man-
ner: in taking the intercultural 'genesis' of the conceptual field of 'nation' in France and
Germany as an example, it will try to develop both a comparative and intercultural mode
of investigation in conceptual history. We propose therefore to distinguish five dimensions
(or levels) of analysis (both valuable in national conceptual history and in comparative and
intercultural perspectives):
1c> the lexicologicai dimension of concepts and conceptual fields. This level is based on the
morphology oflexicological items (words for example) and their interrelations;
2C> the semantic dimension of semantic fields and their interrelations is based on the mean-
ing of concepts and implies different degrees of extension concerning their semantic
'overlapping'. Methodological issues are the analysis of frequencies, on the basis of a
more or less restricted corpus of texts, then the constitution of semantic fields and third
the analysis of eo-occurrences in syntagmas (in sentences, but also in more complex
structures);
3C> the intermedial dimension aims at the presence of concepts in different materialiries of
communication, like orality, literacy, semi-orality, rituals, narrative or non-narrative fic-
tions, etc.;
4C> the socio-cultural dimension concerns the use of concepts and conceptual fields by politi-
calor social groups and in different societies and cultures;
SC> the interculiuml dimension finally aims at the study of the transfer of concepts and con-
ceptual fields to other cultures.
Conceptual history has largely privileged the two first dimensions and directed its atten-
tion, among the third level, mainly and often exclusively to argumentative structures,
whilst neglecting visual representations, rituals, narrative fictions and semi-oral or oral me-
(:()NCEPTliAl. 111ST()RY AND CONCEPTUAL TRAl"SI'ER 115
dia (like songs) which contribute as well, and in an often more emotionalized and effective
way, to the social diffusion of o ~ p t s and conceptual fields.
The fifth level of intercultural relations has remained a relatively little-explored field, es-
pecially with regard to the inrerculrural dimension. This means: the processes of relations
between two or various cultures, taking forms like reception processes, translations, imita-
tions, adaptations, productive reception or, more generally, the phenomena of cultural
transfer. This inrerculrural approach to cultural phenomena should be distinguished
sharply from a comparative level of investigation which is sometimes (but not necessarily)
related to it. A comparative perspective includes the analysis of two (or several) cultural
phenomena - for example concepts - which are not necessarily linked together by direct re-
lationships or contacts, whereas the intercultural approach focusscs on the direct interrela-
tionships between cultures (by means of texts, human interaction, or other forms of com-
munication).
Intercultural Breaks
At the end of the l Srh and the beginning of the 19th centuries, Franco-German cultural
ties attained an intensity of exchange never equalled before or since. They embraced a wide
area of cultural practices and phenomena, and in France in the second half of the 18th cen-
tury concepts such as 'Culture' and 'Linerarure' expanded, as did the concept 'civilisation']
to cover them. They embraced the area of transfer of knowledge, translation, the field of ar-
tistic and scientific activities and forms of expression as well as the collective concepts of
perception and identity, under which the concept of the 'nation' took on an outstanding
role in the last decades of the 18th century. From this concept of 'nation', the mental and
cultural breaks can be more preciselydetermined, which during the last decades of the 18th
century lead towards a growing autonomy of national culture in Germany and France, to-
wards an alienation from foreigners and 'imported' cultural products; and above all, a men-
tal distancing from every self-evident cultural exchange and the acquisition of foreign lan-
guages and culture, which distinguished the elite cultures of the 18th century.
This distancing manifested itself in different ways in Germany and France through con-
temporary political and journalistic discourse. In France in 1793/94, above all in political
discourse, one notices an increasingly negative use of the concepts 'etranger' (foreigner),
'culture etrangere' (foreign culture) and 'cosmopolinsme' (cosmopolicism). 'Etranger' was
associated at that time exclusively in the political dimension of meaning with concepts
such as 'foreign party' (parri etrenger). 'exile' (exil) and 'arisrocrares' (arisrocrates). They
stood as a threat to revolutionary and republican France through the political and military
coalition between the foreign feudal powers and the exiled French aristocracy. In the years
1794 and 1795, like other politicians in the culture and language of the Jacobin phase of
the French Revolution, Henri Crcgoire and Benrand Barere gave the terms of 'erranger'
(foreigner) and 'langue eerangere' (foreign language) an additional cultural dimension, in
so much as they classified the use of foreign, 'alien' ('fremder') languages in the adminisrra-
tive, educational and communications sector within the French territory as a threat. Barere,
for example, described in his very influential Rapport du Comise de Salut Public sur le!
116 HISTORY OF C(lNCEPn
idiomes the languages used within the French territory fot everyday, administrative, and
written purposes as 'langues etrangercs' (foreign languages) and saw ID their spread an in-
strument offanarisme' (fanaticism) and superstition, which, above all, helped '[es ennemis
de la France' (the enemies of France)."
In the German language and cultural sphere at the end of the 18th and beginning of the
l urh century, the process of national autonomy and segregation from every so-called for-
eign culture also began to manifest itself. It did so by viewing itself, above all, as a process of
a dawning of national consciousness. This was expressed not so much as a political concept
and pattern of discourse, but more as the construction of a mythological national identity
and related symbolic figures. Early German nationalism was different from the national
discourse in France, which in essence remained closely attached to the ideal of the
universalistic anthropology of the Enlightenment until the Third Republic while keeping
its basic elements down to the present. This German nationalism of the turn of the century,
by contrast, had already laid the foundations for a specifically German identity in 1800.
More widely determined than in France, the nationalistic discourse in Germany broke free
from the 'norm of universalisric humanity' ('Norm universalistischer Humanitat") and, for
example, according to the thesis of Aleida Assmann, 'allied itself with the special character-
istics of a nation deeply rooted in its language, history and territory'." The genesis of a con-
ception of a national identity followed as a result of the French Revolution and the war of
liberation. This national identity is said to be intrinsically inculcated in every member of a
nation, but must be strengthened through education. This was formulated in the words of
the historian Ernst Troeltsch at the beginning of the 20th century through 'wir wollen
deurscher werden als wir waren' {we want to become more German than we were').' In-
stead of a process of a national dawning of conciousness, this process - from the angle of an
interculturally organized social history of the culture - is understood as a complex process
of reception and productive processing of very diverse sequences of terms and chains of dis-
course whose main focus was the filiation of ideas between France and Germany.
Intercultural Relations - The Concept of 'Nation'
The analysis of the German-French dictionaries of the epoch 1770-1815 first of all covers a
broad and surprising transfer of the semantic field of 'nation' from French into German.
All together there are almost 70 terms concerning this semantic field, of which 59 appear
in German translation and are defined in dictionary entries.' Closer examination of the
contemporaty French-German dictionaries reveals that in addition to the 39 terms in the
available listed concepts in A. Abdelfettah's study," which hitherto was the only one that
deals with French-German concept transfer, proof of at least 20 more terms within the
mentioned field of concepts has been established. Among these are the terms
'Narionalfahne' (national flag), 'Nationalmuseum' (national museum), 'National-Pan-
theon' (national Pantheon), 'Nationalpalast' (national palace), 'Narionalgeisr' (national
spirit) and 'Nacionalrodrend' - a translation from 'Nationicide', which is translated by
Reinhard in his dictionary as 'genocide', 'Volksmord' or 'Volksmorderisch' (genocidal), and
C.ONC.FI'TUAI. HISTORY AND COI'CEPTUAL TRANS1'ER 117
by Snetlage and Lacoste as 'Narionalmorder' (murderer of a nation) - as well as the con-
cepts 'National' (national) and 'Nationalfamilie' (national family)."
Godicke, in particular, brings out the concept of 'national' by underlining the expansion
of meaning which it underwent from the beginning of the revolution. According to his dic-
tionary entry for 'national', 'this word has gained one of the largest expansions, that which
a word is only capable of when its meaning can be easily understood out of context'. In the
German translation of Snetlage's dictionary by Lacoste, the term 'national family' is hidden
in the relatively extensive entry for 'Republik. franzosische' (republic, French). The entry
appears remarkable for it concisely and manifestly stresses this democratic-republican di-
mension of meaning of the French concept of nation. Since the 18th century, and espe-
cially since the years 1792/93, this dimension of meaning has fundamentally differed from
the signification of the German semantic field volk-Nation- Vaterland (people, nation, fa-
therland).
According to the authors of the Lacoste-Snetlage dictionary, the solidarity of the nation
is founded on common republican values and morals, such as the establishment of a com-
mon weal (Einrtchtung auf das allgemeine Wohl'), the satisfaction of general needs
I'Befriedigung allgemeinet Bedurfnisse'I, love, freedom and brotherhood ('Liehe, Freiheit
und Brudersinn'] and the conviction d ~ alle Burger in Ansehung ihrer Rechte und
Obliegenheircn gleich sind' - that all citizens in view of their rights and obligations ate
equal.' Furthermore, as derived from these characteristics of the definition of 'nation', the
national territory and it's composition as well as the cultural and linguistic qualities of the
inhabitants are mentioned, whose 'differences [...] had to attract the attention of the legis-
laror'".
The influence of the French model of the nation whose wide range and intensity dis-
plays the outlined semantic field, manifested fascination with various things French. Georg
Forsrer, Johann Heinrich Campe and Karl Friedrich Reichardr, German intellectuals and
travellers to France, expressed an open admiration of the new French model of the nation
in their political and journalistic works. Forsrer's was, without a doubt, the most intense,
revealed in his political demand that the left bank of the Rhine should go to the Republic
of France. ]ohann Georg Heinzmann, in a work from the year 1800, traces back the mili-
tary superiority of France directly to the 'spirit of the fatherland and national conscious-
ness' (Varerlandsgeisr und Nationalsinn), which in other European countries, and espe-
cially in Germany, was practically non-existent. A large number of articles in the German
press demonstrate a fascination for the French national celebrations, which were also cel-
ebrated in parts of the German linguistic and culrural sphere due to the occupation of the
left bank of the Rhine. This fascination is partly mixed with a certain scepticism towards
the mobilizing powers of the new French concept of nation and its institutionalisation. A
detailed anonymous report, which appeared in the magazine Minerva in 1806, saw the
French national festivals as the revival of ancient traditions, particularly of the Roman vic-
tory celebrations. III The author of a report on the French national celebrations, entitled
Uber die JTanzdsischen Mttionalftste, which appeared in the Journal der neuesten
Weltbegebenheiten, was more sceptical since it saw the festivals as largely depicting mecha-
nisms of a factional spirit CgroGtenteils Spielwcrkc des Faktionsgeistes'),I' In a commcn-
118 HISTORY or-CONCFI'TS
tary, the publisher of the magazine characterized national celebrations during the time of
the revolution. He particularly emphasized the counter-example of the military national
celebrations, the martial dimension of which shows a disproportionate degree of national
mobilisation from the more political and moral-philosophical ones:
Der Verfasser erwahnr der Siegesftste nichr, die jedesmal den grbgten Eindruck
machten. Die kriegerische Muaik, die Hymnen des Vaterlandes, die erbeuteren
Trophaen, der Nablick dcr verwundeten Krieger und der Umen, die den Mann der
verstorbenen Helden geweiht waren, erfullren die Zuschauer mir heiligem Schauer und
hoher Begeisterung. Buonapartewird sieauch niche wiihrend des Krieges
vernachlassigen.'-
Even if the English example of promoting 'Nationalgeisc' (public spirit) (Archenholtz)
played a particular role in the decades of radical political and cultural change around 1800
111 Germany, the conceptions of a rebirth (,Wiedergeburt') of the German nation and of a
nationalization {Nationalisierung'] of the German people were already nonetheless in es-
sence thought of against the backdrop of the development of new concepts of nation and
their institutionalization in France. The ideas oftNarionalerziehung' (national education),
'Narionaldichrer' (national poets), 'Nacionalfeste' (national celebrations) and of the
'Nationaltempel' (a concept that was supposed ro take on concrete form by 1807 through
the Walhalla project), which had developed between 1795 and 1815 and were widely dis-
cussed in German journalism, had the French national model of the revolution as their
fundamental frame of reference. The French national model of the revolution was accepted
and assimilated in Germany through various means; through direct travel experiences,
through the reading of French works in the original, bur most of all through translations.
Schuban's obituary of Klopsrccks death, L.l for example not only had the headline 'Na-
tional- Verlusr' (a new word creation, translation of the French term 'perre narionale' - a na-
rionalloss}, but refers to the model of the 'Ecrivain national' (national writer) through his
entire conceptual pattern. This was a model which had been created during the late Renais-
sance (above all through the cult of Voltaire) and the French Revolution. It stated
the function of the national poet as "patriot" and at the same time spokesman of the
nation indicates the necessity of securing for him a firm place in the collective memory
of the nation through monuments, "a classical edition of his works" ('eine klassische
Ausgabe sciner Werke') and lastly through a biography!'
Upon examination of the translations from French to German, one finds that in the period
1770-1815 almost 200 writings were translated into German in which the words 'nation'
and 'national' appear in the title. These were predominately in the form of magazine arti-
cles. Of the translated texts almost all the programmatic writings of revolutionary French
nationalism can be found. Among a wealth of anonomous literature the translated writings
of Barere, Sieyes, Robespierre. Lepelletier de Sainr-Fargeau (who exercised a determinant
influence on the national pedagogical writings of Fichtc). Mercier, Narbonne, Cregoire
c();.JCEI'TUAI. lilYIOlty ANI) c.orcc :FI''I"lIAI. TRANSI'I'.1t 11 ')
and Lareveilliere-Lepeaox can be found." This last work, translated into at least two edi-
tions, formulated concepts concerning the development and institutionalization of na-
tional celebrations and secular festivities in the framework of the new republican national
model. This work runs parallel to the similar deliberations of Henri Cregoire and Boissy
d'Anglas in the years 1793/95.
Two lines of argument are prominent. Each is to be found, in similarly discursive form,
in the spokesmen of the early German nationalism one to twO decades later. One stresses
the necessity for abstract political terms such as 'Cesera' (law), 'nationale (jemeinschafr'
(national community), 'Verfassung' (constitution) and 'cffentliche Meinung' (public opin-
ion) in order to make the collective event of public celebrations and ceremonies more aes-
thetic and meaningful, with the purpose of implanting itself III the minds of the popula-
tion.
In the other, Reveilliere-Lepeaux emphasizes the importance of non-literary media and
forms of expression in the framework of the conceived national celebrations, under which
the fine arts, and above all, music and song stand out. His arguments here refer to views on
aesthetics and the effects of media, as they were developed between 1795 and 1800 in the
circle of /deologues, among others by J.-L. Roederer in the magazine Journal d'Ecanamic
politique.I' These approaches bind the media-aesthetic and rhetorical points of view with
basic anthropological assumptions which were adopted in a modified form in the German,
as well as in the French nationalistic discourse of the 19th century.
At the same time asvmmetries and semanticdistortions become clear in a detailed com-
parison of the translation and the original. 'Ceremonies civiles' (civil ceremonies) as well as
'institutions civiles' (civil institutions) are translated into German as 'burgerliche
Cebrauche', which has an entirely different dimension of meaning from the original
French one. The concept 'bourgeois' or 'burgerlich", which is more a specific social status,
CUVi out the collective egalitarian dimension of the term 'ciroyen' (citizen) as well as its his-
torical embedment ID the revolutionary occurrences of the years 1789-94. A similarity can
be observed in other translations of certain concepts: 'Constitution' is translated through
the compound 'Landesverfassung'. which makes one think of the term 'Reichsverfassung'
(imperial constitution); '[oix civiles' (the civil code) with the term 'burgerbcbe Ceserze':
'vie civile' (civil life) through 'burgerlichcs Lebeo', the rerm 'ciroyen' (citizen) finally is not
translated as 'Staarsburger', but simply in the narrow sense of the rerm 'BUrger'. The new
attitude of the French towards state and nation, which is described through the term
'devouemem' (devotion) and consists of an active and action-oriented element of meaning,
is translated by the more passive insinuating term 'Ergebenheit' (submissiveness). The term
'Esprit public' (public spirit), which in the context of the 18th century showed a narrow se-
mantic bond with the term 'Opinion publique' (public opinion), is translated as
'Cemeingeisr', a term which in German emphasises an inherited idea of Patriotismus even
more." The term 'espece humaine' (human race) finally reappears in the translation of the
even stronger individualising term 'Mensch' (man). In the original text this term displays a
collective and universalistic dimension and should have been translated with
'Menschengeschlechr' .
120 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
Reveilliere-Lepeaux's writing, which is characteristic of the transfer of the French model
of the nation and its conception, indicates the basic problems involved in the translation of
French political vocabulary into Germany at that time. Due to their integration into an in-
herited web of terms, in which 'burgerlich' (civil), 'Cebrauche' (traditions) and
'Verfassung' (constitution) (in the sense of'Reichsverfassung' (imperial constitution oc-
cupied a central status, important dimensions of meaning of the French original text were
weakened or faded out. This encouraged forms of productive reception of the French
model of nation in Germany, which, according to Ernst Moritz Arndt, took the aesthetic-
semiotic model of the French concept of nation, its forms of rhetoric and pattern of expres-
sion as a model, but at the same time provided it with an entirely different ideological di-
mensron.
Conceptual Transfer and Productive Reception - The Example of E.M.
Arndt
Early German nationalism was specified by a more or less radical rejection of those multi-
cultural and especially Franco-German dimensions, which characterized the elite culture of
the 18th century. Its most important spokesmen were Ernst Moritz Arndt, Iohann Gottlieb
Fichre, Ludwig Jahn and Theodor Komer, Nevertheless in the way they saw themselves,
there was a clear break not only with the anthropological and political-philosophical con-
ceptions of the Enlightenment, but also with the Revolutionary French idea of nation.
Arndt and [ahn countered this with an ethnically based model of the nation, the hypostati-
zation of the \/ofk-terms, which, according to Arndt, moved into the place of the foreign
word 'nation' and the construction of a 'deurschen Eigenan' - a German individuality.
At the same time Ernst Moritz Arndt insisted on the danger of a premature acquisition
of foreign languages in an entire series of writings which were published in the years 1804
to 1815.
Whoever exercises and pursues a foreign language from his youth must inevitably
confront his opinions, thoughts and feelings with strange ones, will finally have to
perceive his native Germanness incorrectly and the characteristic "self" must always
remain a mystery!"
According to Arndt, what is even more dangerous than the regular usage of a foreign lan-
guage in verbal or written communication is its employment as the language in which les-
sons are conducted in [he general school system. Arndt uses the metaphor of the drip in
this connection in order to describe, From his point of view, the resulting fatal conse-
quences: The drip erodes the rock, and in the end nothing more remains save for a hollow
and insubstantial shell. In 'erhnicizing' to a certain extent Humboidr's conception of the
integration of language and philosophy, he regards an early acquisition of foreign languages
as a danger and a final fundamental weakening of'das eigenrliche Wesen' (rhe true pro-
found being). In doing so, he creates the new German concept of nation, which took the
form of a radical distancing from rhe contemporary French one. It was founded on the idea
CONCFPTUAL HISTORY AND TRANSFER III
of the justified dichotomies of 'Eigenes' (own] and 'Fremdes' (foreign), and of
'Munersprache' (native language) and 'Premdsprache' (foreign language) whereby each was
provided with specific semantics. The first ones were said to be 'rein' (pure), 'keusch'
(chaste), 'kilhn' (bold), 'rugendhafc' (virtuous), 'anmucig' (graceful) and at the same time
'mannlich' (manly) and 'schwer' (powerful), whilst the French language, as a Romance lan-
guage par excellence, embodied the (negative) qualities of'das Sinnliche' (sensory), 'das
Spielende' (playful), 'das Schimmernde' (glimmer), 'das Scherzende' (jest) and 'das
Plappernde' {chatter}. Arnclt put these qualities into the field 'Weiblich' (feminine), using
it as a metaphor for the nature of the French.
That means that the language that they speak is the reflection of a people; it is clear to
me from the language of a people what they want, what they strive for, what they tend
to, what they love and experience the most, in short, in which direction their true life
and aspirations range. One now sees what I am leading to. I want the practice and
usage of the French language III Germany abolished. I
Arndt seized the dichotomy of 'Murrersprache' (native language) and 'Premdsprache' (for-
eign language) which should be learnt, according to him, as late as possible, with the help
of an imagery based on gender oppositions. Contrasts are thus not only deprived of their
diverse nuances and their transitional stages, but at the same time become, to some extent,
naturally determinate due to this gender opposition.
The same is even true for the national patterns of identity which Arndt and jahn con-
ceive as a national being. In doing so, they follow a long tradition of stereotyping and at the
same time create a perception of other peoples, which in turn creates a collective identity.
However they extend it in a political and (proeo-jcrhnic dimension, which points towards
the German nationalism of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century. This long tradition
goes back to Tacirus' Germanic, which was rcadopred in numerous German and French
Tacitus-translarions of the 17th and 18th century, and which had also preserved a lan-
guage-politics and cultural dimension along with the German language patriotism of the
Baroque period. Thus in his major work Deutsches Volkstum (1808), Ludwig jahn places in-
troductory observations before the chapter entitled Volksgefiihl. 'Volksgefuhl' is a term to
which he gives preference over the word translated from the French, 'Ncrionaigefuhl' (na-
tional sentiment]. In the observations he demands the complete replacing of every foreign
cultural influence in the German language sphere. In Chapter seven of his work, which is
entitled vermeidung fremder Wiirter {the avoidance of foreign words') one reads: 'Foreign
expressions for people, titles, offices, actions and traditional objects must be entirely abol-
ished, and should be avoided in laws, decrees and in business, and only retained there,
where it remains comprehensible.' On the cultural level, jabn's discourse is determined by
the fundamental polarity of Auslanderei' (foreigness' or all rhar which is foreign) and
'Deursches Volkstum' (German national traditions and folklore). In this he sees German
national traditions embodied in the language, public festivals and Volkstracht, the national
costume.
122 HISTORY01- (:(It\'CEI'TS
In Arndr's theory this dichotomy expands into a confrontation of lexically complex and
ramified semantic fields which form groups around the opposition of 'Eigene' (own) and
'Premde' (foreign). He thus sees the French national character through the qualities of - to
begin with the most used term - 'Zierlichkeit' (daintiness, petiteness, delicateness),
'Empfindsamkeir' (sensitivity, sentimentality), 'Ceselligkeir' (sociability, conviviality),
'Geisr' (spirit, mind) and 'Lebendigkeie' (liveliness), but also of 'fehlende Tiefe' (lack of
depth), 'Platrerhaftigkeir' (fickleness), 'Eirelkeit' (vanity) as well as tending toward waste-
fulness and luxury (welscher Tand', French trinkets), These are qualities which he believes
are found in the form of aesthetic mutation in the classical French literature of the 17th
and l Brh century (Corneille, Racine, Voltaire]. He sees, on the contrary, the lexically char-
acterised national identity of the inhabitants of the German linguistic and cultural sphere
as embodying the qualities of 'Aufrichrigkeic' (sincerity), 'Ehrlichkeit' (honesty), of
'mannlicher und rUstiger Kraft' (manly and sprighrly power), of the "Tiefe des GemUts' (the
depth of disposition) and of the 'Pahigkeit zur grofsen schcpfertschen Tat' (the ability to
perform a great and creative feat), This vocabulary predominantly contains the terms refer-
ring to German identity such as 'das Deutsche' (German), 'deursche Art' (the German way)
and 'die Deurschheit' (Germanness) but also 'Uranlage' (ancient profound identity),
'Germanischer Charakrer' (Germanic character) and 'Germanisches Cemut' (Germanic
nature, disposition).
The field of concepts in Arndr's discourse which describes inrerculrural relations, above
all between German and French culture, in the end contains almost 40 terms which charac-
teristically display a consistantly negative meaning. Arndt describes the linguistic, and in a
broader sense, cultural relations between both national cultures with terms which either fall
back upon the metaphors of infection (Test' - plague; 'Krebs' - cancer), of paralysis and
blindness (ersrarren' - to be paralysed, petrified; 'lahmen' - to paralyse, to cripple;
'verblenden' - to blind), of disguise and obliteration (verwischen' - to become blurred:
'verkleiden' - to disguise; 'verlarven' - masking), of emasculation (Verweichlichung - soft-
ness; 'Abglanerung' - smoothness) Ot, as the fifth metaphor web, fruitless imitation (Hffen'
- to ape; 'Nachaffung' - aping; 'pfauen'!" - to strut). Arndr lastly describes cultural
syncrerisms as a 'Mischmasch des verschiedenen' (diverse mish-mash)." its mediators and
social bearers as frogs and frenchies, Frenchified Germans and absurd half-breeds
CWelschlinge', 'verwalschte Deutsche', 'Iacherliche Halblinge'), as well as 'balbe Englander
und Franzosen, zuweilen wohl Turken und Polacken' - half Englishman and Frenchman,
occasionally Turk or polack."
Arndr's political and anthropological ideas, which embedded national differences into
ethnic polarities, found their way into a discourse with a dearly militant character in the
years 1804 until] 807, after the traumatic experience of the Prussian defeat by Napoleonic
France.
Lampoons such as Geis! derZeit (1806), Uber VOikshaf und den G'ebrauch einerfremden
Sprache (1813), Das Wort von 1814 und das Wort von 1815 uber die Iraneoscn. der
Soidatenkatechismus (1813) and a large number of patriotic songs and poems expressed per-
formative linguistic gestures which openly called for hatred of the french enemy and for its
military and physical annihilation, A lampoon such as Ober den Voikshafor poems such as
CONCEPTUAl. HI\T(lRY ,\Nl) (:ONOYIUAl.Tll.ANSFER 123
Des Deutschen Vater/and (which had been written in the historical context of the Battle of
the Nations and were then published) absorbed conceptual images such as the 'Vergiftung'
(poisoning) of their own identity through foreign languages and cultures (particularly the
French culture). Arndt integrated them in a discourse which was no longer only observant
and descriptive, but provoked aggressive actions and emotions. And thus in one of his most
well-known and widely adopted poems Des deutschen Knaben Robert Schwur, the keywords
'Deursches Vaterland' rhyme with 'welscher Tand' and the rerm 'HaW wirh 'ohne
Uncerlau'. The linguistc style is determined through the oath's para-religious pathos:
Auch schwor ich heiGen biut'gcn Hag
Und tiefen Zom ohn' UmerlaG
dem Franzmann und franz'schem Tand
Die schanden unser deurscbes Land."
A poem such as Deutschcs Kricgslied from the year 1813 uses a political vocabulary, which
corresponds almost entirely to that of the songs of the French Revolution (1789-1815). For
example, in the Marseillaise, the word 'battle' is linked with the idea of sacrifice for the Fa-
therland. In the place of the imperative 'AlIons (enfants de la petrie)' 'Frischauf!' (Let us
away!) and 'Heran!' (Come on!) appear. Other keywords of the national revolutionary dis-
course, and the way they are personified in the Marseillaise, are found in a direct transla-
tion in Amdr's poem. One therefore finds "Tyrann' for the rerm 'ryran' (tyrant),
'Henkerschwerr' for 'epee du bourreau' (the executioner's sword), 'Vaterland' for 'parrie'
(fatherland), 'Freiheirsfeind' for 'ennemi de la liberre' (enemy of freedom), 'blurlijger
Kampf' for 'lutte sanglante' (bloody battle) and 'Sklaven' for 'esclaves' (slaves). These are
terms that consistently constitute a pattern of identity and concepts of the enemy.
Onto a translated French political term, Arndr thus loads a fundamental (proro-lerbnic
dimension of meaning to the German translated potential which had been already spread
in France with an uncommonly broad range of translations into German in the yeats 1789-
1815. He does this in a similar way to [ahn and Kdrner, the most important representatives
of the German nationalism at the beginning of the 19th century. Even though semantic
fields are fundamentally, mutually, and exclusively structured and in parts lexically identi-
cal, the terms such as "Tyrannen' (tyrants), 'Varerland' (Fatherland) and 'Freiheirsfeind'
(enemies of freedom) were given another meaning in the context of German nationalism.
They were connected to ethnic registers of perception instead of to political concepts such
as 'Aristocrates', 'Emigres' and 'Conrre-Revolutionnaires' as in the Marseillaise, or in the
revolutionary song Ce ira and were henceforth directed at the German and French peoples
in their entirety. Even though Amdt's linguistic gestures of hatred and the physical annihi-
lation of the opponent were directly formed on the lexical and pragma-linguistical level
from the speech-act structures which were prevalent in the political discourse of contempo-
rary France, on the semantic level they did not focus on a politically and socially defined
enemy, but rather on the French nation as a whole.
According to Arndt, the formulation and social dissemination of antithetical patterns of
the perception of all that is foreign, are in the end an indispensable basic requirement for
124 HISTORYOF CONCEPTS
the creation and strengthening of the national consciousness. National identity and na-
tional concepts of the enemy are - as in the political discourse of the French Revolution -
directly linked together; only Arndt defines them ethnico/(y. In his article Uberdeurscbe Art
und dasWelschtum bei unshe writes: 'So let us hate the French ever so much. Let us hate our
Frenchmen when we feel that they are weakening and unnerving our virtue and strength,
they who dishonour and ravage our power and innocence! As Germans, as a people, we re-
quire this antithesis, and our fathers were a far better people than we are now, at that time
when this opposition and revulsion for the French was at its most fervent.'!-1
Even if the term 'Rasse' (race) is not explicit (as a lexical term) in Arndr's discourse, it is
indeed semantically anticipated in many tespects through terms such as 'innersrer Kern des
Teutschen' (the heart of the Germans), 'Germanische Art' (Germanic way), 'Deurschheit'
(Germanness), 'deursche Volksrumlichkeir' (German folk character) and 'Uranlage' (an-
cient 'profound being'). Arndt's concepts of the identity of the 'Deursche Nation' (German
nation) are linked furthermore to an unmistakeable anri-seminsm and a rejection of every
cosmopolitanism or 'WeltbUrgerrum' which he sees as a radical contrast to the
'Nanonalgeist' (national spirit). Arndr's nationalistic discourse consequently founded a
virulent rejection of any multi-cultural structure of the German society and nation. His
discourse shows clear lexical and structural similarities with the political discourse of the
late Renaissance and of the French Revolution. In his essay Uber Sittc, Mode und
Kleidertracht Arndt writes:
We Germans will remain wretched slaves if we do not destroy the foreign way, tradi-
tions and language from within our borders and look at our people, our way and
traditions, with the pride that they deserve."
Conceptual Transfer and Media Pragmatics
It might seem quite paradoxical that Arndt's nationalistic discourse which is very close, in
its ideological dimension, to Fichte and jahn. the two other leading figures of the early
German nationalism in the beginning of the 19th century, was derived by a man, who
throughout his entire life intensively adopted the French culture not simply intellectually
(he was a reader and translator of French writings) but also physically by travelling through
France. Ever since his grammar school days in Greifswald, Arndt was a fascinated reader of
[ean-jacques Rousseau (above all his pedagogical writings), Montesquieu, Louis-Sebasnen
Mercier and Morelly whose Code de fa Nature he arrribured to Dideror and translated into
German with an extensive commentary." Above all, his almost six-month long journey
through the France of 1799 should have exerted a lasting influence on Amdr's concept of
France and his reception of the political culture of the French Revolution. At the end of a
stay in Austria and northern Italy, he travelled through the south of France in the spring of
1799 and spent the summer months in Paris. He described the life of the skilled workers,
the media communications as well as the radical change in the political culture of the late
Directory (1795-1799) in a style of expression which clearly characterizes the reading of
CONCFI"I'UAL HISTORY AND COl"CEl'TUALTRANSFER 125
Louis-Sebastian Mercier's Tableau de Paris. He did so with a thoroughly remarkable sensi-
tivity for everyday culture and the forms of sociability. He seemed to be particularly im-
pressed with the fervour of the French 'Volks- und Narionalgeist' - which was entirely lack-
ing in Germany, as he noted: 'Apeople of 30 million have become the ridicule of Europe
because the national spirit is lacking"> In his travel log, he describes his conviction of the
necessity for an extensive and systematic national education as an instrument of
'Nanonalisierung' (nationalizing) the divergent social stratum. This occurred after visiting
the new republican schools which had caught his attention just after he had arrived on
French soil in Nice, the creation of national symbols and places of rememberance
(Pantheon, statues and monuments), as well as witnessing the public staging of national
celebrations.
The transfer and conceptual realization of the French 'Nanonalpadagogik', its
conceptuality and its media structure, resulted in an entire series of political and journalis-
tic writings in the years 1807 through 1815. Amdr, indeed, lexically adopted the political
discourse of the late Enlightenment and the French Revolution, in which he gave the con-
cepts a new dimension of meaning that partly went back to the l Zrh century, Cerman-lan-
guage, patriotic tradition of the stereotyping of a people. He also enlarged a militant field
of terms, in which the terms 'Erbfeind' (traditional enemy), 'VolbhafS' (hatred of a nation)
and 'Deurschheir' (Germanness) took on a central role. In addition, he projected the con-
ception of a national identity onto a broad field of cultural, as well as natural phenomena,
which extended from the landscapes, to the festivals and traditions as well as to the lan-
guage and the problem of the national frontier. This was done in the same way as other
spokesmen of the early German nationalism did. In his writing Der Rhein. Deutscblands
Scram und niche Deutschlands Grener. he rejects the French discourse on the 'natural fron-
tiers' (of Prance) explicitly and wirh a radical distancing. He links his conception of na-
tional frontiers with the term language borders, which, for example, completely contradicts
Danron.
I say: language is the only valid natural boundary. God created the distinction between
languages so that a larger, lazier and worthless crowd of slaves did not exist on Earth.
The different languages create the natural separation of peoples and countries. They
create the large internal differences of the people, in order that the stimulus and
struggle oflively powers and urges come into being, through which the spirits keep
their fervour."
But the actual originality ofAmdt's nationalistic discourse, in comparison, for example, to
Fichre, Korncr and jahn, lies less within his vocabulary and semantics than it does with the
structure and extent of the employed media and forms of expression, which for the most
part explicitly or implicitly fall back on rhe French model. His war-songs (such as Deutehes
Kriegslied), parriotic catechisms (like the Karectnsmus fUr den deutschcn Kriegs- und
Wehrmarm), and his appeals to the German people and those politically responsible
(among other works Fantanenhir fin kunfiiges Deurschland; 1815) shows the genesis of a
political mass literature within the German language and cultural sphere which is directed
126 IIIST(WY (ll' ((l",(:FI'IS
at a wide readership through its lexical structure, its semantics and its genre. His Auftufan
die Deusschen zum gemeinschaftlichen Kampft gegen die Franzosen from the Battle of Nations
of 1813, for example, nor only falls back on the semi-oral stytr
H
of the Address, through
which the author tries to transpose the emotional linguistic gestures of oral speech in the
form of writing and tries to address the 'nation' and 'those in power', but connects three
different genre structures in his text form which are often found in rhis combinarion in late
l Srb-century French literature." First an argumentative text, whose characteristic style is
that of a speech, which begins and ends with an appellative imperative, i.e. 'Deutschel': sec-
ondly a song or poem, for example the two poetic texts von Korzebue which appear later
on; and lastly political aphorisms, which have the structures of the slogan and aphorism
and extend through the text, to a certain extent like catechismic mnemotechnic sentences
with para-religious insinuations. In the beginning he writes: 'Germans! Thy proverh is:
Honesty is the best policy. It is a holy statement, that time can not destroy, that no tyrant
can condemn.' And in the second part of the text, entitled Aber Lands/eute, noch zweierlei
zur Erinnerung('Fellow countrymen there are still two things to remember') there are the
following aphorisms:
firstly: stay true to thy character under every circumstance. Be JUSt to thy friends and
thy enemies (..). Secondly: Thou hasr a thousand-fold proofs that thy enemy's work ate
lies and deceptions. Do not then become inconstant through its feigned innocence and
hypocritical pretences, when it speaks of its purposes through its impertinent boasting
and when it speaks of its fears.?"
One can also observesimilarities in the transfer and the productive acquisition of other popu-
lar structures of genre. A work such as Arndr's Lob deutscbcr Helden from the year 1814 fol-
lows the same purpose of development and the spreading of a lay pantheon of political and
military heroes. This work took its basis from the Eloge des heros ftanrais, which had already
been published as a collection of lampoons in 1791 and from which Arndr derived the tide of
his work. His patriotic satire Kurze und wahrhaftige Erziihlung von Napoleon Bonapartes
verderblichen Anschliigen from the year 1813 directly took up a form of political popular lit-
erature, which had also been created by the French Revolution in the area of the narrative
genre, above all in the form of the almanac. The characteristic titles such as the terms 'kurz'
(short), 'wahrhafiig' (honest) and 'verderblicb' (corrupting), the very explicit subtitle, which
reveals the conrenr of Arndr's work, and the style of text take on the narrative form of the
Bibliotheque Bleue, the almanac, as well as the leafler. These forms are provided with political
commentary modeled on the texts of the Revolution. The leaflet had also been circulating
within the German and French language spheres in a similar form.
A look at the diverse connections between the origin of the modern concept of nation in
Germany and France allows one to speak legitimately of the 'inter-cultural genesis' of Ger-
man nationalism, its conceptual framework and its media strategies. The reaction in the
discourse of German nationalism to the French concept of the nation, its semantics, rheto-
ric and aesthetics was influenced even more by the processes of exchange, of transfer and of
the productive reception ofconcepts and structures of genre than has so far been presumed.
CONCFPTUAl.l-IISTORY AND O.l"CEPTUAI.TRA;..JSHR 127
This was made possible through an epoch of intensive cultural transfer, above all between
France and Germany. This transfer possessed a particularly extensive and politically influ-
ential area on the level of the semantic field of 'nation'. At the same time the development
of the German concept of nation - with the central terms ofVolk' and 'Varerland' - which
was identified by publishers like Amdr in the context of the wars of liberation, and the idea
that was linked to it, had far-reaching (inter-Iculrural consequences. This lay in the radical
questioning of inter-cultural relations, in a new discourse of identity and in the creation 01
concepts of foreigner and enemy. During the 19th century these concepts, which in the
end proved fatal, not only established the collective patterns of identity, but were also deci-
sively to reduce and restrict the intensity and structure of the trans-nationa] cultural trans-
fer.
128 HISTORY 01' CON(:VI'TS
PART III
Concept and Image
CHAPTER 10
Words, Images andAll the Pope sMen
Rapbael's Stanza delta Segnatura and the
Synthesis ofDivine Wisdom
BRAM KEMI'ERS
"If l'd meant that, I'd have said it," said Humpty Dumpry. Alice didn't want to
begin another argument, so she said nothing."
Painted words are a crucial part of Raphael's images in the Stanza della Segnacura. one of
the most important rooms of the Vatican Palace. He painted this extensive pictorial pro-
gramme between 1509 and 1511 for Pope Julius II. Its meaning is, at least in pan, indi-
cared by inscriptions. The ceiling of the vaulted room contains four medallions with texts
on painted tablets in the hands of small angels, each of them flanking a female figure. The
painted words read as follows: CAVSARVM COLNITIO, IVS SW[M] VN1CVIQ[VE] TRIBVIT, NVMIJ\E
AFFlATVR and DlVINAR[VM] RER[VM] NOTlT!A (FIG. 1). These texts accompany figures with
the following attributes: two books (with rhe titles NATVRAUS and MORALlS) and a throne; a
sword and balance; a book, a lyre, a laurel crown and a blowing figure; and an olive crown.
It is generally assumed that these four painted inscriptions are direct quotations from ca-
nonical texts, and rhat they have a clear meaning: philosophy, jurisprudence, poetry and
theology. They are supposed to clarify the large scale frescoes on the walls below, which are
known as the School of Athens, the Parnassus, the Disputa and the Jurisprudence (or Jus-
tice) wall. However, the titles, descriptions and interpretations of the paintings appear to be
the result of subsequent ideas, in which various aspects of much later stages in the history
of philosophy, politics, an and theology are reflected. A reconstruction of the post-Renais-
sance interpretations and a reconsideration of rhe sources and their context may be helpful
to understand and correct some major fallacies; the meanings ascribed to the frescoes hap-
pen to have changed together with their intellectual context; the inscriptions themselves
may serve as a starting point to unravel the riddle that is obscured by several anachronisms.
Raphael was one of the artists employed by Pope Julius II 0503-1513) in the Vatican
Palace. More than his colleagues, with the exception of Michelangelc. Raphael acquired ev-
erlasting fame. A first overviewof his work and reputation was Vasari's extensive testimony
published in 1550 and 1568. Vasari also provided an iconographic analysis of the frescoes
on the ceiling and the walls. He stated that the 'School of Athens' was painted first, and
WORDS. IMAGES AND Al.LTHE POPE'S MFN \ 31
F1CURE 1 Raphael, Ceiling of [he Stanza delta Segnatura, fresco
132 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
FIGURE 2 Raphael, 'Parnassus' and 'School of Athens', fresco
WORDS,IMACES AND ALLTHE l'OJ' E' S ME!': 133
F G ~ R 3 Raphael, 'Jurisprudence wall' and 'Disputa', fresco
134 III STORY OF CONCEPTS
that [he Evangelists, to the viewer's left in the foreground of that fresco, played a crucial
role, harmonizing Greek philosophy and Christian revelarion (FIG. 2). In the second half of
the seventeenth century Raphael was considered rhe culmination of artistic standards, but
by then the iconography of the 'School of Athens' was seen in a radically different way, and
this fresco was considered stylistically much more mature than the 'Dispura' on the oppos-
ing wall. This change in the interpretation of Raphael's images in the Stanza della
Segnarura, more then a century after Vasari, is exemplified by the French author Freart de
Chambray and the Italian painter Beliori. Their ideas became generally accepted, whereas
Vasari's were dismissed as being confused and thoroughly misleading. Vasari was thought to
be wrong in dating the 'School of Athens' before the 'Dispute' and in giving a theological
reading of this fresco; he was crirized for confusing the two images, and for this mistake an
explanation was provided: he had used prints with misleading texts attached to the copies
of Raphael's frescoes. The prevailing viewis, rhat the 'Dispute' is a purely theological image
and that the 'School of Athens' - being larer and superior in all respects - represents phi-
losophy (FIG. 3). These twO conceprs are seen as rhe major elements in a fourfold classi-
fication of knowledge - with poetry and jurisprudence - that are linked to [he four facul-
ties of the universities, or to the artes liberales:'
Essential to any interpretation is an understanding of the words that accompany
Raphael's frescoes, but these themselves appear to be problematical, partly because their
translation and interpretation is anachronistic. The relation between word and image in
Raphael's frescoes in the Stanza della Segnaeura poses several questions about [he philoso-
phical, political, theological and artistic background of Raphael. his patron Julius II and
their advisors, as well as of the later critics, in particular Vasari and Bellori. Both painters,
who published their ideas in extensive treatises, played a crucial role in what may be called
the crirical history of Raphael's images. Their interpretations are considered to be one of
the red herrings in art history and also, though less prominently, in cultural history. Even
the modern titles of the frescoes are part of the problem.
An Inverted History of Ideas
A vast art historical literature exists on the Stanza della Segnarura, which, for the greatest
part, is highly specialized and not easily accessible to the non-specialist. Modern scholars
followed the view that had been developed in the late seventeenth century: Vasari had con-
fused the two major frescoes, and prints with misleading inscriptions were the ground for
his errors.' Therefore, it may be helpful to have a closer look at the history of interpreta-
tions, both of words and images, because the history of ideas about this Stanza is itself of
considerable interest to the rheme of concept and image, and the ways they are connected.
Even in editions of Vasari's Vite and direct quotations from the Vite, editors add the re-
mark that the author confused the 'Dispura' and 'School of Athens'. Milanesi devoted a
note to this issue and Vicenzo Golzio, in his publication of Raphael documents of 1936,
added the following note; 'Il Vasari confonde insieme la Scuola d'Atene e la Disputa del
Sacramenta; a cio forse fu tratto dal voler dare a] prima dipinto una interpretaaione
cristiana'; Golzio took the confusion for granted and explained this by Vasan's wish to give
WORDS, IMAGES AND ALLTHE POPE'S MEN 135
FIGURES4A and 41 Giorgio Ghisi, prim after Raphael's 'School of Athens'
136 HJ.STORY OF CONCEPTS
11
WORDS, IMAGES AI" D ALL THE POPE'S MEN 137
... ,I j , I I I
FIGURES SA and 5 8 Gi orgio Ghi si, print after Raphad 's 'Dispura'
138 Ill STORYOf CONCEPTS
WORDS . IMAGES ~ N Al.LTHE POPE'S MEN 139
the School of Athens a Christian meaning. He gave the same explanation for Ghisi, who in
1550 made a pnnt after the School of Athens, and added a quotation from the Acts of the
Apostles (FIC. 4A, 4n)." The Penguin Classics edition has very few explanatory notes, but
here George Bull added; 'Vasari's account of Raphael's work is very muddled. Very briefly;
Raphael was working in the Stanza della Segnatura (..). Here the two chief frescoes are
known as the School ofAthens and the Disputation concerning the Blessed Sacrament'.
In spite of an occasional claim that Vasari was more correct than later art historians were
willing to acknowledge, Gombrich, Von Einem, Shearman, Pfeiffer, Wood, Winner and
most other specialists favoured Bellori's view over Vasari's." Scholars who passed a milder
judgement on Vasari in this respect, were not particularly successful." However, Vasari's in-
terpretation is much closer in time and context to julius H, as appears from books dedi-
cated to him, than Preart's or Bellori's, writing more than one and a half centuries after
Raphael had composed his sophisticated and highly original pictorial programme. Recent
hisroricgraphy in the field of humanism which pays attention to the 'theological human-
ism' at the papal court has hardly changed this well established art historical interpretation,
which, in fact, remains very close to Burckhardr's."
Step by step, philosophy and theology were separated.' Augusre Comrc, for example,
interpreted the history of knowledge as a ptocess in which philosophy surpassed theology:'
Between 1750 and 1850 philosophers considered themselves as intellectual authorities in
all branches of knowledge, at the expense of the pnests and other rheclogians." In the
words of Kuhn, paradigms had changed, and this scientific and artistic revolution was so
successful that the past was also interpreted in the light of the new paradigm. These
changes caused a very questionable reading of Raphael and Vasari.!'
Freart de Chambray and Bellori on Vasari and Raphael
In the cultural context of the new Academies, both in Paris and in Rome, admiration for
Raphael made corrections of Vasari most welcome, and the new reading allowed the
'School of Athens' to become the emblem of the Renaissance, as a revolution in art and
science. In fact, not Bellori but the French author Roland Frean de Chambray 0606-
1676) was the first to attack Vasari. He was the protagonist of classical doctrine in France,
and opposed the modems who became so conscious of the achievements in the natural sci-
ences that they challenged the absolute authority of antiquity. His arguments were partly
influenced by institutional changes: [he Academies had become organisations claiming au-
thority in art and science, but officially without any competence in theology" Both Frean
and Bellori needed a legitimation of the Academies in Paris and Rome. Raphael proved to
be useful for their purposes, hut only once Vasari's interpretation of him could be falsified.
They had to criticize Vasa ri's reading of the 'School of Athens' in order to use this fresco in
their plea for academic classicism. In doing so, Frearr and Bellori introduced, although in a
rather impressionistic fashion, the principle of falsification in art historical discourse.
In 1650 Frearr published his Para/Me de [architecture antique et de la modeme in which
he laid down the rule of stricr adherence to Vitruvius and ancient architecture. Preart ap-
pears to be vety critical of everything that diverged from the standards set by anriquiry. On
140 HISTORYOfO)NCFPTS
the basis of mere descriptions and not of actual architecture, he accepted the superiority of
Greek artists, A year later the Tratrata of Leonardo da Vinci appeared in print, both in Ital-
ian and in a French translation by Frearr himself. Then he started to write a work of his
own, Idie de la perfi'ction de la peinture. In this 'Idea of the Perfection of Painting', pu-
blished at Le Mans (the birthplace to which he returned after a not very successful career in
Paris), Preart asserted that Vasari had completely misunderstood Raphael's iconography.u
This book appeared in 1662, ten years after a partial translation ofVasari's 'Life of Raphael'
into French which, however, omitted mosr of the account of the 'School of Athens' because
an engraving of this image was, Preen said, well known.
Prearr judged the art of his own time and the art of the past according to a new set of crire-
ria: Invention, Proportion, Colour, Movement and Disposition - the [artcr including
mathematics and perspective. These principles were used to analyse three engravings after
Raphael, the judgement o/Paris, the Massacre o/the Innocents and The Descent o/the Cross. He
considered Michelangelo's Last judgement to be the major cause of the decline in painting,
breaking as it did the rule laid down by the ancients. When Freart arrived at the 'School of
Athens', he changed his method more and more from description to critique. His expose fi-
nally became an overt attack on Vasari's text rather than an analysis of Raphael's images.
He starred with a criticism of the inscription on Giorgio Ghisi's print of 1550, which
linked the scene to the Apostle Paul on the Areopagus of Acts Chapter XVII; this inscrip-
tion is an abridged reformulation (Fn.. 4A, 411),'" Ghisi's print marked an important step in
what was to become a long and complicated history, including both concepts and images.
Ghisi did not give a justification for the words he added and his later critics did not provide
an argument as to why he was wrong.
Chisi's engraving was published at Antwerp by Hieronymus Cock who established the
printing house Aux QUdtre Vents that was to become the most important firm in the Low
Countries. He also published a print of the 'Dispura' (FIC. SA, 51l). Carel van Mander re-
counted that Michiel Coxie 'was not pleased' with this publication of de Schole by Raphael.
Coxie used the fresco as a basis for his Death o/the Virginin Saint Goedele at Brussels. Un-
til the early seventeenth century learned artists in both Italy and the Netherlands took the
Christian and Biblical nature of Raphael's fresco for granted. The French classicist Frearr
was the first to attack this idee recue, and he launched his attack in a remarkably agressive
way.
Freart defended 'Raphacl. nostre principal et premier object' against Vasari's Christian
interpretation. His section 'C!NQVIESME ESTAMl'E. Dv GYM:-JASE Ov ACADEMIF DES
PHILOSOPHES D T H E ~ E S starts with a bold statement about the eminent fresco, described
according to this title:
Or dans cette liberre de chois, je n'en veux point chereher d'aurre que celle que j' ay
presentement entre les mains, puisque l'occasion me l'offre auec assezd'auanrage pour m'en
contenrcr; car en effect elle me paroisr vne des plus bellescrdonnances qc'il ait iamais
peinres, et d'vne tres grande Idee et rres-magnifique. C'est la representation d'vn de ces
fameux Cymnases de la Grece, OU l' on void vne assemblee generale de rous lesScauants de
I'Anriquire. tant Philosophes que Ccomerres, Astrologues, et autres Illustres (92).
WORDS, lJ\lAGES AND ALL THE POPE'SMEN 141
It must have been an unbeatable thought to Frearr that the best painting by the most excel-
lent modern artist, and one closest to his image of 'classical antiquity', was interpreted by
Ghisi and Vasari in the light of ideas so remote from his neo-classical ideal. For him, rhe
early reception of Raphael was a culture shock. Therefore he claimed that Vasan, as an his-
torian, was a complete ignoramus, as was the Graueur, who added the words 'Paulus
Arhenis per Epicureos et Sroicos quosdam ere.' to his copy (93). The print maker was 'mal
inforroe du Sujer'. witness the link between Paul in Athens ('Cene Hisroire est dans [esActs
des Apostres, all Cbapirre dixsepriesme'. Frearc added) and Raphael's fresco. It would have
been much better, had Vasari been content [0 be a 'simple Hisrorien' (l01), but by adding
interpretations he fell victim to accumulating mistakes (104), and became rather 'le
personnage d'vn Pascariel et dvn Harlequin que d'vn Histctien...', This is all the more
regrettable because 'vne des plus raisonnebles Compositons de Rapbael' (l02) is at stake.
Frearr argued that Vasan misidentified most of the figures and that he neglected both the
rules of decorum (by identifying one of the figures to be Diogenes) and the unity of time
and place (identifying the left hand group as Evangelists, and Prolemy and Zoroaster to the
viewer's right). These criteria were crucial to heart's conceptual and institutional frame-
work, the French Academy of his own time, whereas unity of rime and place was much less
relevant to Vasan and [ulius II.
To prepare the ground for his attack, Frearr first quoted Vasari in Italian and then gave a
French translation 'de ce long passage' because 'la langue ltalienne n'esr pas aI'vsagede rout
le monde' (94-97). He concluded that without these long quotations 'je n'aurcis jamais pa
persuade- l'inepeie et la bassesse des raisonnemens de ce grand Diseur de rien' (lOO), In his
eye the blending of the Christian and the pagan was an evident anomaly. As a fierce classi-
cist he took part in the Querelles between the ancients and the modems, and shared the po-
lemical tone of that debate, using phrases such as: 'le discours amphibologique de Vasari'
and 'ses imaginations extrauagantes' (l07).1'; To Frean one of the most rational composi-
tions and one of the most easy to understand, iconographically, was completely obscured
by Vasari's reading of the image. I!> His conclusion was as follows:
There is therefore no need to search for anything further in this Picture, than can be
seen explicitly (expressiment), and rest assured rbar Raphael had no intention to present
to us anything of an Emblem in this Subject, which is nothing other than a straight-
forward (naissue) representation of one of those famous Gymnasia of Greece, where the
Philosophers and all kinds of Academicians made their place ofAssembly, to discuss
their Studies, and enjoy themselves with Exercises. P
In this academic conrexr, it is all the more remarkable that Frearr criticized Vasari for his
symbolic interpretation of Raphael's frescoes, using the atgument that everyone, i.e. the
learned amateur, could see what Raphael painted, and intended. If one considers Vasari as
one of the first to give extensive iconographic interpretations, Prearr deserves the epithet of
the first critic of iconography and iconoiogy. And he proved to be remarkably successful in
that respect, partly because the Roman painter Giovanni Pietro Belloti read his book and
accepted his view, although with some moderation and an addition on chronology.
142 HISTORY01' COt\CFPTS
Eventually Bellori became more influential than Freart who had given his book to Nicolas
Poussin, the French classicist painter then resident in Rome, and a possible go-between.
Freart described Poussin in his Parallele as 'l'honneur des Francais en sa profession et le
Raphael de notre siecle'. In 1695, Bellori'sinterpretation of Raphael's frescoes in the Stanza
delIa Segnatura appeared in print. I" Already on the first page, Bellori claimed that he is
forced, non scnza dispiacer; to correct Vasari because of his gteat mistakes. He gave an even
more elaborate description of Raphael's frescoes than Vasari had done, correcting him in
some fundamental respects and with regard to several identifications that were less crucial.
Bellort's and Freart's intellectual background differed widely from Vasari's, who was still
familiar with the culture of the papal court of the early sixteenth century. In Bellori's and
Freart's time and in particular in their circle, classical antiquity was no longer considered as
a predecessor of Christian civilisation, but as something of its own and, according ro some,
even superior to medieval theology. The idea of conceptual progress remained, but the clas-
sifications had changed and the priorities shifted. Therefore vesao's theological interpre-
tation of the 'School of Athens' required a correction, according ro the standards in science
and art of the late seventeenth century.
Bdlori explicitly rejected the idea of a reconciliation of philosophy and astrology with
theology because he was convinced that a combination of classical philosophers and theo-
logians or Evangelists was absolutely inconceivable, which, indeed, ie was in his circle. Such
a synthesis in Rapbael's most famous fresco seemed to him impossible. 'Wrong is the name
given by Vasari: concord between Philosophy, and Astronomy with Theology, because
there are no Theologians nor Evangelists, as he wrote at length, perhaps confusing the sec-
ond picture with the first one of the Theology and the Sacrament.' The changes in
classification and conceptualizatiou were such, that a fellow painter of over a century ago
was accused of confusing the twO most famous frescoes that he discussed in his book.
Vasari's chronology was also doubted by Bellori. In his depiction of the theologians - the
'Dispura' - Raphael still followed the 'old painters', in that he used real gold, both on their
clothes, and in the background. Bellori failed to remark that gold was also used on the
'School ofAthens'. He was, even more then Vasari, absorbed in a concept of artistic progress,
and interpreted Raphael's iconographic device in a purely stylistic way. Gold was not consid-
ered by Bellon to represent a new Golden Age or the light from heaven connected with the
Holy Ghost, but an artistic element inherited from the Middle Ages and soon abandoned by
the mature Renaissance artist that Rapbael became as a painrer of the 'School of Athens'. In
this way Bcllori added both chronology and style to Freart's critique ofvasa.
Bcllori's reinterpretation was linked to an idea about intellectual progress. Medieval theol-
ogy was, in his time, considered to be inferior to classical philosophy and most of the papal
theologians of the early sixteenth century had lost their authority in academic circles. A theo-
logical reading of what he called the Imagine dell'aneica Glnnasio di Atene 0 vero la Filowfia,
was, therefore a mistake, that had to be historically explained. Like Frearr, Bellori considered
this image to be purely philosophical, in the sense of his time, and saw the 'Sacramemo
dell'Eucaristia' as exclusively Christian. He related the rhemes to the medallions above, and
gave them the titles La Ieologia (quoting the inscription as Sciemia Dioinarum rerum) and La
Filosofia, the other two La Glllmprudenza, /) uero Giustizia and La Pofsia.
211
\X!()RllS. IMACFS AND ALLTIlE I'OI'F'S "lEN 143
In the footsteps ofPrean, Bellori considered a print by Giorgio Chisi (Ciorgio Mantovano
as he called him) as a major step in the history of this misundersranding: 'Improprio el'argo-
memo, che si legge impresso sotto l'intaglio di quesra imagine, cavaro degl'atti di San
Paolo..:. According to Bellori, a print after Raphael's fresco contained an inscription that,
incorrectly, assigned this image a theological meaning, and Vasari used this print as his source.
Hence, he claimed, Vasari's description was a mistake. Rellori added yet another element; ac-
cording to him, such errors occured after Raphael's death. One of the first to commit this er-
ror was Agostino Veneziano in his print published in 1524, 'where the figure of Pythagoras is
transformed into the evangelist Saint Marc, and the youth leaning by his side with the Py-
thagorean diagram came to be transformed into an angel with the text of the angelic saluta-
rion.:" Bellori went on to argue in favour of the title 'School of Athens', or even better
Ginnasio di Atene, and these concepts, together with the frequently used polarity between
philosophy and theology, served him as tools for reinterpreting the images."
Vasari on Raphael andthe Christian Paradigm
In 1550 and again, in his second, enlarged edition of 1568, the Tuscan painter and archi-
tect, Giorgio Vasari, published an extensive account of the frescoes in the Stanza della
Segnarura. It is the most detailed iconographical interpretation of his book. Obviously
Vasari was content with what he had written, because [he text on the Stanza della Segnatura
was hardly changed or enlarged in the second edition. This unusually detailed description
was part of Vasari's artistic biography of Raphael. which belonged to his Vite de'piu eccel-
lenti pirtari, archircttori e scultori, starting with Cimabue and ending with Michelangelo,
Raphael being one of its heroes.
In his uita of Pranccsco Salviati, Vasari recounted how they acquired access to the Sranze
and were allowed, in 1532, to make sketches while Pope Clement VII (1523-1534) went to
hunt near his villa at Magliana. Four of Vasari's drawings have been preserved, now belong-
ing to the Louvre in Paris.:" As a young painter Vasari had direct access ro these rooms in
the Vatican; he copied the original frescoes from morning to night in rhe freezing cold, as
he remembered not without pride and nostalgia." His memory, notes and drawings were,
as were his historical sources, supplemented by ora] information and prints made after
Raphaej's frescoes, but these proved to he of more limited importance than has been sup-
posed." The first complete print was published in the same year as Vasari's book. In his sec-
ond edition he only made, with regard ro the Stanze, marginal alterations. Ar the beginning
of his account of Raphael's career in Rome, Vasari stated:
However, after he had been welcomed very affectionately by Pope juiius, Raphael
started to paint in the Stanza della Segnatura a fresco showing the theologians re-
conciling Philosophy and Astrology with Theology, in which rhere are portraits of all
the sages of the world shown disputing among themselves in various ways. Standing
apart arc some astrologers who have drawn various kinds of figures and characters
relating to geomancy and astrology on some linle tablets which, by the hands of some
very beautiful angels, they are sending to rhe evangelists to expound.
144 1I1S']'ORY or CONCFI'TS
After a long description, including an identification of many persons present on the fresco,
Vasari goes on:
There were also some medallions, four in number, and in each of these Raphael painted
a figure symbolizing the scenes beneath. Each figure was on the same side as the story it
represented. For the first scene, where Raphael had depicted Philosophy, Astrology,
Geometry, and Poetry making their peace with Theology, there is a woman representing
Knowledge, seated on a throne supported on either side by a figure of the goddess
Cybele shown wearing the many breasts with which the ancients used to depict Diana
Polymastes.
Vasari implied that this personification of Knowledge (FIG. 6) is a new invention.
Concerning the second tendo, Vasari choose a different approach. According to him,
'Raphael depicted Poetry, in the person of Polyhymnia crowned with a laurel' (FIG. 7). This
would imply a repetition, because all nine Muses are depicted on the wall below, as Vasari
related a little later. Identification of the female figure as one of rhe Muses, though it did
not fir into a fourfold system, was Vasari's solution for this iconographical problem. Not
able to find a direct precedent for this figure, Vasari proposed an idennficarion of his own.
In the third medallion RaphaeI depicted, according to Vasari, Theology (FrG. 8) and in
rhe fourth, Justice (FIG. 9). Vasari's incerpreration implies a classification that is not per-
fectly systematic: a new invention (Knowledge), a Muse, Theology and a virtue (Justice).
With regard to the four medallions, Vasari's reading has been followed by most later au-
thors, including Bellori.
In spite of several uncertainties, one can safelyconclude that the four female figures are
all new inventions, making use of existing personificarions and props. The inscriptions
comment upon the identity of the female figures, and vice versa. New concepts are closely
related to new images, and the former's function is primarily to add meaning to the latter;
in their turn, the images illustrate the inscriptions which refer to canonical texts, and to
people - from the past to the present.
All the Pope's Horses and All the Pope's Men
The Stanza della Segnatura was one of the last in an enfilade of rooms on the third floor of
the Vatican Palace. It had a ceremonial entrance to the right of the portico of Saint Peter's.
Julius ordered a monumental staircase to be built from Saint Peter's to the Sala Regia, the
great hal1 of the Vatican Palace (FIG. 10). To its left was the Sistine Chapel and to the right
were two slightly smaller halls. The fourth floor was at the time occupied by a terrace on
the east wing and a loggia and a birdhouse to the north; the adjacent Borgia tower had a
large room for the papal collection of rare books and other precious objects."
The ceremonial stairs were ordered by Julius II, as part of an overall renovation of the
Vatican Palace, which was to be transformed from a medieval castle with towers into a Re-
naissance palace with loggias. On the east wing of the third floor, facing the courtyard there
were the private chapel, the pope's bedroom and his anticamera. Through a small corridor
WORDS, IMACES ANDAII.THE POPE'SMEN 145
F1<;URE 6 Raphael, Medallion with CAVSARVM COCNITIO, detail of the ceiling, fresco
146 11lSTORY OF O ~ E I T S
FICURF 7 Raphael, Medallion with NVMINE AFFLATVR, detail of the ceiling, fresco
WO]{llS. 1:V1A(;ES AND AI.LTHF.\'OI'E' S:V1EN 147
FICURE 8 Raphael , Medallion with mVINARVM RERVM NOTITJA, detail of the ceiling, fresco
148 HI STORY OF CONCEPTS
FICURE 9 Raphael, Medallion wirh ]VS SVVM VNIQV1QVE TRIBVIT, derail of the ceiling, fresco
WOR DS, ]),.lACES AN[) AI.LTHE ['OPE'S Ml'N 149
~ ; ~
'l
!
5\"1
\'- j)
cn
Lr'tJ
-. --
,
, ,
, ,
,
'. ---
FI(;URE 10 Plan of the Vatican Palace and old and new Saint Peter's
the pope could go from his appartment to an enfilade of workrooms in the northern wing
of the palace, which was built as a square around a courtyard. Thus, turning left a second
time, visitors would enter these four rooms, parallel to the two halls mentioned above, but
situated on the north side.
This north wing was constructed by Nicholas V (1447-1455); Sixtus IV (1471-1484)
had put rhe great papal library on its first floor; Alexander VI (1492-1503) had decorated
the rooms on the second f100f, and added a monumental tower to this wing. The third
room of the northern wing on the third floor was called the Stanza della Segnatura by
Vasari. It was flanked by two rooms of the same size and form: the Stanza di Eliodoro and
the Stanza deil'Incendio. Then came the rooms in the tower, built by Alessandro Borgia
and finished by julius It Its decoration on the third and fourth level was undertaken by
Julius 11.
27
He finished the 'guardaroba' on the level of the Stanze, and ordered his private
library to be arranged on the floor above. Finally [ulius was the patron of a wooden dome,
designed by Bramante, and constructed on top of the Borgia tower. On the level of the
biblioiheca secreta, a loggia was built that ran parallel to the Stanze below.
The Stanza della Segnarura served the Pope as his main workroom. It was to the early
sixteenth century Popes, what the Oval Office in the White House is for the President of
150 IIIS-I()I\Y (11 (:(IN(:EPTS
the United States. In this room, the Pope would sign official papers, such as a motu proprio,
and witness when bulls were affixed to official documents; he could have any small scale of
Ficial meeting in the Stanza della Segnatura. The Pope could meet advisors and ambassa-
dors there, who would have had the pleasure or the obligation to wait in one of the adja-
cent rooms. Ambassadors came from the southern and eastern part, and waited in the
Stanza di Eliodoro, all the Pope's men could use the Stanza dell'Incendio as their
anticamcra. The Stanze were directly related to one another as anticamera, workroom and
retrocamera, being the link between the Pope's own rooms and the official halls.
So the Stanza della Segnarura was a semi-public room, accessible to learned men of high
social standing from Rome, Italy and the major cultural centres of Europe. Most of the
people to enter this room were well educated, in art and science. Yet they did not come ex-
clusively for high culture, which, in this context, was not only to serve an artistic goal, but
had to convey a message as well; a message that focussed on the reigning Pope himself:
painted and in reality. The inscriptions served as one of the keys to understanding the
meaning of the images, and an important one. Learned painters, such as Vasari and Bellori,
formed only one section of the public who tried to understand these frescoes, rather than
be caught in a riddle.
Inscriptions as a Conceptual Invention
In the RapbaelIirerarure. the four texts on the ceiling are supposed to correspond to a well
established classification of philosophy, jurisprudence, theology and poetry. As a source,
mostly the university faculties are mentioned, and sometimes the organisation of libraries,
or the artes iiberala. However, the identification of the inscriptions with these four con-
cepts is misleading because it tends to anachronism and it obscures a great deal of the
meaning that the painted words could have conveyed to the educated people visiting the
Stanza della Segnarura at the time of ]ulius 11. It suggests that philosophy and theology
were mutually exclusive; lines are drawn where they did not exist. The holistic structure of
both words and images is misunderstood in favour of a system of separate disciplines
which, at that point had not yet been invented.
Moreover, in the early sixteenth century concepts such as PHILOSOl'HIA, THEOLOGIA or
IVSTlTJA were available and, indeed, were used as inscriptions, but these words were not
chosen in the Stanza della Segnarura - a deliberate choice and one to be taken seriously. In
the Borgia appartmem, on the floor below the Sranze, Pinruricchio painted
personifications of the seven arts and sciences, an example that was not followed by
Raphael. Whilst still a cardinal, julius II had commissioned the tomb of his uncle, Sixtus
IV. The sculptor, Antonio Pollaiuolo, shows the dead Pontiff lying on a marress. On the
sides of the tomb ten female figures represent, as the inscriptions testify: 'grammacica'.
'rherorica', 'dialectica', 'musica', 'geornetria', 'arithmetica', 'astrologia', 'prospectiva', and,
placed next to the Pope's head, 'philosophia' and 'eheologia'. To these concepts short sen-
tences were added, derived from authorative texts, although not in the form of quotations.
So even although there was some variety of classification available at the time, the words
that were actually painted in the Stanza della Segnatura do not follow any canonical classi-
WOROS. IMAGES ANI) ALL THE I'OPES MI;N 151
fication precisely. To mention another important system, neither the concepts nor the im-
ages of the Stanza follow the programme of learning that characterized the uudia
bumanitatis: grammar, rhetoric, poetry, history and moral philosophy," There existed no
official fourfold classification consisting of philosophy, jurisprudence, poetry and theology
as the direct result of papal patronage at the court of ]ulius Il. Poetry was not considered
one of the faculties, and the fresco below the medallion with NYMINE AHL\']"VR shows more
than poetry alone - even taken in the wide sense characteristic of antiquity; the 'Parnassus'
boasts persons who were renowned for music, astronomy and history. Raphael's words and
images differ from the known systems of artes liberales, usually seven, sometimes nine, but
never four, only rarely mentioning philosophy, and never including poetry. Generally, the
artes liberales - the trivium (grammar, dialectics or logic and rhetoric) and the quadnvium
(geometry, arithmetic, astronomy and music) - contribute to the mother of all knowledge,
philosophy, which in turn is considered to be the servant of theology, anciila theologiae.
Neither does Raphael's pictorial ptogramme follow a standardized principle according to
which libraries were organized. His father, Giovanni Sanri, had described the library of his
patron, Pederico da Moncefelcro, Duke of Urbino, mentioning, among others theologi,
philosophi, poeti, legistl and medici. Inventories of libraries, including the Vatican Library on
the ground flour and the new bibliotheca secreta which was rounded by julius If in the Bor-
gia tower, show considerable variety in number and formulation of categories."
Hence, the four inscriptions are a remarkable conceptual invention, indeed referring to
established traditions, but not copying them. They reflect a syntax and semantics with
intellectual possibilities that surpass [he meaning of four nouns: philosophy, jurisprudence,
theology and poetry. The inscriptions stress interdisciplinary wisdom, based on a vancty of
sources, conveyed in different genres and serving several purposes.
Allusions and Reminiscences
To complicate matters even mote, this conceptual innovation does not followany text liter-
ally, as is suggested in most of the secondary literature. Art historians have provided several
texts [hat would explain the painted inscriptions, but none appears to be an exact quota-
tion; some texts by famous authors contain one or more of the words that Raphael painted,
but dose reading indicates that none of the inscriptions is a verbatim quotation.'?
In his 'Iopica (XVIII, 67), Cicero concluded: 'causarum enim cognino cognirionem
eventorum facir'. This book provided an adaptation and explanation of Aristotle's book of
the same title; they both discussed a wide range of concepts in the field of argumenracion,
oratory and invention of speech. Cicero's concise definition means: 'for a knowledge of
causes produces knowledge of resulrs'." In this section of his Topics. Cicero discussed the
relevance of the knowledge of causes and effects for orators, poets, historians and philoso-
phers. In a wider context, he argued that knowing causes means one has an ability to know
the past, understand the present and predict the future, which connects 'cognirio' to
'prudenria' and to other virtues.
152 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
Cicero used the word 'cognirio' throughout his work, and in a very wide sense, not re-
stricting 'cognicio causarum' to its first meaning, natural philosophy (and what much later
became known as physics or the natural sciences as a specialized discipline), but linking this
concept to moral values. The words 'causarum cognitio' also appeared in Virgil's Georgic
1I, 490 (the concluding section of the second book): 'felix, qui poruir rerum cognoscere
causas' - 'blessed is he who has been able to win knowledge of the causes of things'. The
importance of such knowledge as a contribution to human well being was stressed time and
again by the poet Lucretius in his De rerum natura; this work, to which Cicero responded
without mentioning Lucrerius, was christianised to a lesser degree than Cicero and Virgil."
Lucretius was a pre-Chrisnan poet who was not sympathetic to most aspects of religion,
but did include themes such as knowledge of heaven, gods and religious ritual. His critical
attitude towards the belief of his era and his ideas about atoms did not imply an anti-reli-
gious view tout court; Lucretius was not primarily proto-scientific in a modern sense, but a
poet with a prophetic vision, a philosopher of nature and, in some respects, even a theolo-
gian, interested in the Muses, Cybele, Venus and Epicurus, whom he venerated almost as
gods. In the Georgica Virgil harmonized Lucretius, Cicero and traditional religion.
Before Lucretius, Aristotle, whose thought was transmitted and popularized - together
with other Greek texts - by Cicero, frequently used both the concept of 'cognicio' and
'causa'. In Cicero's works these concepts, as well as 'notitia' and 'afflara'!', occur often. To-
gether with res, cognitio and causa, Cicero's concepts and definitions acquired a crucial
place in the juridical vocabulary. Hence they occur in Justinian's Instittaiones; that was in-
cluded in the Corpus iuriscivilis, as this collection from the early sixth century had been of-
ficially known since 1583, although this name was current much earlier. Bonavenrura's De
perftetione el/angelica provides another clue: 'Sapienria est cognitio causarum'." In short,
'causarum cognirio' is not bound to any single author, book or sentence; on the contrary,
'causarum cognitio' occurs in several rhetorical, poetical, juridical, philosophical and theo-
logical contexts. Similar observations hold true with regard to the other three inscriptions.
Justinian's opening sentences define justice, law and the science of law. 'Justice is the
constant and enduring will to give to each what is his due right. Jurisprudence is acquaint-
ance with divine and human things, the knowledge of what is JUSt and what is unjust',Y; In
this way civil law was introduced, both in the Digesta and in the accompanying textbook
that was to instruct students. This was a book which itself had the force of law since it was
an integral part of the Emperor's compilation. These general definitions were derived from
Ulpian. the main source of Justinian's codification. In his turn he alluded to Cicero who
defined justice as 'animi affecrio suum cuique trihuens', that is the inclination of the heart
to give each his dueY' In these juridical definitions moral, philosophical and theological
considerations were considered relevant. The Corpus referred to the study of things divine
and human. It also stated that legal expertS could be compared to priests, and recognized
the value of philosophical knowledge in making right judgements." The main source for
concepts and definitions was Cicero.
The importance of theology is stressed time and again, by Dante, for example in Pur-
gatorio '.IJC<, 31-3: 'She is crowned with olive, and her clothes of white, green and red are
the colours of the theological virtues, Faith, Hope and Charity'. This corresponds to the
WORDS. IMACES AND ALLIHE POPE'S MEN 153
personification flanked by the putti with DIVINARVM RERUM NOTIT1A and to the virtues below
IVS SVYM YNICY1QV TRIBVlT. Dante aimed to integrate theology with philosophy, in a poetic
form and with a political-juridical goal in mind.
This combination of 'divine and human things' also occured in the title of a text by
Marcus Terentius Varro. He studied philosophy at Athens and was the most encyclopedic
antiquarian in classical Antiquity; with Cicero he played a major role in making the Greek
heritage available to the Romans. His Antiquitates rerum humanarum et diuinanon were for
the most part lost, but the work was extensively used by Augustine. In his De ciuitate Dei,
he provided a detailed summary of Varros argument, to which he gave a Christian reading.
To Cicero, Varro addressed his De linguaiatina, where he discussed concepts such as 'deus'
(God) and 'numen' i.e. divine will or way (VlI, 85), but neither 'cognirio' nor 'noriria'.
Cicero introduced all these concepts; in his De natura deorum he used 'notiria', although
less frequently than 'cognirio'. stressing the importance of both for understanding causes
and God."
To the educated viewer, NVMINE AFFLATVR recalled Virgil's Amen VI, 50: 'adflata est
numine quando iarn propiore dei". 'since now she feels the nearer breath of deity'. This is
said with regard to the Cumaean sibyl, asked by Aencas to prophesy the future. The in-
scription is close to Virgil, but not identical, which adds new connotations to Virgil's fa-
mous words. Mainly because of other Virgilian phrases, in particular the beginning of the
fourth Ecloga, this could be interpreted in a Christian way. The sibyl of Cumae was in-
spired by divine will and foretold the coming of Christ; in Er/oga IV, 4 Virgil stated: 'Ul-
tima Cumaei venit iam carminis aetas; magnus ab integro saeculorum nascitur ordo, iam
redir et Virgo'; the new period implied the rerum of the Virgin and the birth of the child
which, according to medieval interpreters since Lacrantius, was a prophesy predicting the
coming of Christ, while most ancients assumed it referred to Augusrus. 'Numen' is the
mysterious power which the Muses also possessed, a concept that is more abstract than
'deus': this classical concept was integrated in the Christian vocabulary." So Virgil's text,
mentioning the sibyl of Cumae, is used here in different contexts, but it certainly was the
intention that the viewer would think ofVirgil, whom Raphael depicted belowon the 'Par-
nassus'. Throughout his work Giles of Virerbo, a contemporary of Raphael, frequently re-
ferred to the Bible and to Virgil's Aeneisaswell as his fourth Ecloga; he explicirelyalluded to
the divine inspiration of the sibyl."
Divine inspiration, which is a very strong formulation indeed, is used by Raphael both
in a pagan and in a Christian sense. This inspiration included those who wrote about as-
tronomy and history, partly because the first Greek and Roman texts on these subjects were
written in a poetical form. The vates knew the kosmos and could communicate the truth re-
vealed to him as a visionary, influenced by a particular JUror. Poets, dealing with universal
truths, were considered superior to the narrative historians who wrote prose. Plato's Ionwas
one of the older texts to point out the importance of divine inspiration for poets. Plato and
others derived their gift for prophesy from this, as one way to understand world order and
the future of man. This insight was shared by Cicero who also used the concept of being
'aftlata' by the divine. Plato's and Cicero's dialogues vividly described what Raphael de-
picted with EVapYEla: learned men and one woman, reading, lecturing, writing, listening,
154 HISTORYOFCOt"CErTS
drawing, arguing and thinking. Inspiration, reason, observation and revelation were con-
nected. In the eyes of Iralian humanists, this inspiration could extend to later inrerpretarors
and translators of texts. It should be clear how much this theological and artistic paradigm
differed from the definition of, for example, history and astronomy since the late seven-
teenth century and even more so in the twentieth.
Summing up, Raphael's inscriptions were intended as references to famous texts, with-
out being verbatim quotations; they were meant as a hermeneuric bricolage, a sophisticated
mosaic of words, phrases and texts. All four inscriptions were literary inventions, alluding
to a number of canonical texts and topoi, investing the pagan words wirh a Christian mean-
ing. In other words, the painted inscriptions were adaptations and reminiscences of texts-
both classical, Christian and contemporary. They refer to a well established tradition of an-
cient writings and later text books, compendiums, introductions for students, commentar-
ies and adagia, all derived from classical and Christian sources. At the same time, the words
comment upon the images on the ceiling and the representations on the walls below - also
adaptations and reminscenses of earlier images.
Words and Images
Connecting four inscriptions, two containing nouns and two consisting of sentences was
both unusual and intellectually very sophisticated. Inscriptions were, as a rule, either a se-
ries of nouns or formed one single sentence. Such a play on words and images was rare in
classical antiquity, bur it became popular in the sixteenth century, witness all the puns in
the work of Erasmus, the flowering of impreseand the rise of emblemarav In this case they
can be read separately, and in conjunction with one anorher: in evety possible combina-
tion, each of them making sense, although an uninterrupted reading from left to right
might have had priority over the other options, adding up to more than fourteen: four
times on their own; six times as a pair; at least three times as a combination of three and
several readings of all four.
The four inscriptions on the ceiling of the Stanza della Segnatura can be read on their
own. At the same time they belong to four painted medallions that form a quartet. Putti
carry the painted words CtWSARYM COCNITIO, IVS SVVM VNICYIQVE TRIBYIT, :-JVMIKE AFFLUVR
and DIVINARVI,l RERYM NOTIT1A. These have a grammatical structure that is mote complex
than an enumeration of four nouns. The closest relation between concept and image is that
between the tablets and the personifications they accompany, but many more connections
- between the words, between the images and between words and images - might be rel-
evant to the people in the room.
Although one has to be careful with translations - translations are at the same time
interpretations that run the risk of being biased or even misleading - these Latin texts may
be translated as follows. CAVSARYM COCN1TIO means knowledge of causes; not only in nature
but also in the human sphere of ethics and jurisprudence, and even in the divine realm.
The concepts are not restricted to empirical knowledge in the sense of facts and causes, but
extend to the human world, including emotions, values and norms, and do not exclude the
realm of cosmology, divinity and God. The text does not by any means exclusively refer to
WOKDS. lMAGES A",D A1.LTHE POPES :'H,N 155
what came to be called the natural sciences. The tablets consist of a noun in the nominative
and one in a genitive, so both words can be part of a sentence containing a verb.
]VS SVVM VNICVIQVE TRIBVIT is a sentence, that can be read in two ways: he or she or it as-
signs everyone his due, and law gives everyone his due. In the first way, the subject may be
the reigning Pope right below the inscription, the Pope Emperor depicted on the wall, jus-
tice or the nouns on the same ceiling; each of the painted personificarions or even God
Himself were more abstract candidates to complete the sentence.
DIVINARVM RFRV.V1 NOTITIA has a structure similar to CAVSARVl.l CO(;:'>IITlO. It has a double
meaning in that the words imply both insight in divine things and knowledge of Holy
Mass: the translation of the first in liturgical form within a fixed ecclesiastical structure.
The last of the three words is again a noun, but in this case it can be read both as a nomina-
tive and as an ablative. The three words refer to theology, hut they are not identical with
that concept.
NV!,lINE AH'LIITVR refers to divine inspiration: she or he or it is inspired by divinity or the
Godhead, a 'reading' similar to IV'S S\'VM VNICVIQVE TRIBVIT being possible. This text is a
short sentence with a verb; its subject could be one of the nouns on the ceiling, the personi-
fication nearby, each one of the Muses and poets below, or the main persons in the room,
in particular the Pontiff himself.
Knowledge is inspired by divinity, and so is insight in Holy Mass. The sentences can be
related to one another by 'et', and this provides a new statement that makes sense as well,
because all branches of knowledge were inspired by divinity. And all were necessary to as-
sign everyone his due. Insight into the divine may be the subject of TRTBVlT, as could be
knowledge of causes. 'Est' may link CAVSARVM COCNITIO to DIVINARVM RERVM NOTITlA, the
one not being possible without the other. A second reading is that knowledge is due to or
dependent on insight in the divine and knowledge of the Holy Mass, NOTJT!A being read as
an ablative.
In addition to this, all words together form a grammatically correct and meaningful sen-
tence that can be read in a number of ways, partly due to the, at first sight, surprising lack
of a metrical structure. Taken as a whole the four inscriptions could mean, to a viewer will-
ing to associate on what he sees and prepared to add an 'et' here and there, 'knowledge of
causes gives everyone his due, thanks to insight in the divine and is inspired by divinity'.
Another reading would be 'knowledge of causes is inspired by divinity and insight into the
divine gives everyone his due' or 'insight into the divine is inspired by divinity and knowl-
edge of causes gives everyone his due'. A fourth meaning would be, 'due to insight in things
divine knowledge of causes is inspired by divinity and law gives everyone his due'. In this
case meditation allows for 'ius' to be a subject (and not the object, linked to 'suurn", of
'nibuere'), which is closet to the Ciceronian definition of Justice that was the basis tor
justininian's adaptation in a Christian context, where 'ius' is, indeed, the object of 'tri-
buere'. The four inscriptions could inspire a continuous meditation of themes such as uni-
versal wisdom, divine inspiration and good judgment. Reflection is guaranteed by the mul-
tiple meaning of the sentences, depending on where the reader starts, and whether he takes
NOTITIA to be a nominative or an ablative, and 'ius' as a nominative or accusative. Discover-
ing a circular structure of the sentence implied continuous contemplation on universal
156 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
truth, inspired by the painted words. Within the context of a culture that cherished enig-
matically hidden truths of universal scope, the revelation of the possibility of such an inter-
pretation was deliberately left open. However, it was deliberately implied rather than de-
fined, and of course only for the happy few with a talent for inspiration." The play with
concepts, and images in the Stanza della Segnarura is unique, yet not without precedent."
Universal wisdom is not only implied by all of the words taken together but also by each
of the inscriptions themselves, the same being true for the images. Yet there are differences
between the inscriptions and the images. NYMINE AFFLATVR emphasizes the divine source of
wisdom and the superhuman value of artistic expression: JVS SWM VN1CVJQVF TRJlWIT
stresses the effects of wisdom on judgement and government; COGNITJO CAVSARVM and
D[VINARYM RERYM ~ O T J T both refer to the content of wisdom, with largely overlapping
fields of knowledge - the one paying more explicit attention to the sphere of humanity and
nature, the other focussing on divinity, both in its pagan and its Christian sense. Again, the
main source of wisdom differs; reason and revelation.
Everywhere a holistic vision is suggested that surpasses a dear cur classification of sepa-
rate and complementary parts. Artes iiberales or disciplinae are not specified one by one, yet
geometry, music and arithmetic are implied on the painted walls; synthesis dominates
analysis, integration is superior to specialization. Yet the unifying principle is left to the
reader to define. Taking the Holy Spirit - the white dove in a magnificent golden light as
painted below DJVINARVM RERVM NOTJTIA - as the dominant visual due, the visitor could
think of divine wisdom, God's grace, the Holy Trinity, Christ and divine revelation. Chris-
tian abstractions could be linked to pagan Greek and Roman concepts such as the world-
soul, the first cause, excellent expression in words and images, the truth, the universe and
the one. The meaning of Raphael's words depends on the ways they are connected and on
the ways they are linked to the images, and to the people in the room, to whom they refer
and who will interpret what they see. It is, by all means, a way of thinking that differs pro-
foundly from science in modern universities and their nineteenth or even late seventeenth
century predecessors. AI; a paradigm it is especially far from nee-positivist Anglo-Saxon
scholarship. The comprehensive view, as it is formulated and visualized, could be character-
ized as Christian Nee-Platonic, in the sense that it attempts to integrate Greek knowledge,
Latin eloquence and Christian faith.
In the first place the words comment upon the personificarions they accompany and
connect them to each other in a meaningful way. In addition they bear a relation to the
other pictorial elements, such as the persons on the walls below. There are also meaningful
relations with the rectangular images on the ceiling. The judgement of Solomon, for exam-
ple, requires wisdom, and, indeed, he is giving everyone his due. The allusions to Cicero,
Lucrerius and others add to the meaning of this rectangular image between the two medal-
lions. The universe is depicted in the next rectangular image; above the globe appears a
personification of harmony and its principle cause; she maintains order in the universe ac-
cording to the principle of the musical harmony that was related to astronomy through the
idea of the harmony of [he spheres." This harmonious order is related to universal know-
ledge of causes, and at the same time it originates from divine inspiration, which also im-
plies a musical harmony of the spheres.
WORDS, IMAGES AND AI.LTHE 1'01'E'S MEN 157
Apollo, in the next rectangular image, is a deity and, as a god, disposes of knowledge of
the divine: therefore he is crowned, whereas his opponent Marsyas is punished, by which
he was purified; at the same time this is another example of justice; Apollo is himself a ma-
jor source of divine inspiration, operating partly through the Sibyls and partly through the
Muses; his laurel is both a sign of rhe inspired poet who is crowned 'poera [aureatus' and of
the victorious in contest - bearing Marsyas who relied on his own an and considered him-
self independent of divine inspiration. Therefore he was punished according to justice.
Then come Adarn, Eve and the serpent; believing the animal, who promised them wisdom,
Adam and Eve lack sufficient 'notiria divinarum rerum', and are therefore punished accord-
mg to jusnce.
Verbal references were elaborated further by the portraits below (FI(;. 3 and 11). julius Il
was himself portrayed on the right hand side of the window that had a view on the court-
yard; and he was present in the room itself when it was in use. The Roman Emperor and
[ulius II both promulgate laws, written on the basis of the jurist's 'cognitio' and originating
from the divine. Typological compansons that inspired the viewer to thoughts from the ab-
stract to the concrete and back again, were almost everywhere in the room. This unusually
rich play on words with images and people is continued on all the walls below, where the
authors alluded to are portrayed in a way that does justice to the interrelation of the con-
cepts as analysed above.
Harmony in the Era of Julius 11
Such a sophisticated invention, verbal and visual, appealed to the intellectuals - to indulge
an anachronism - at the court of julius Il, such as Paolo Cortesi, Marco Vigerio, Crisroforo
Marcello, Egidio da Virerbo, Tommaso Inghirarni and Tommaso de Vio, called Cajetanus
or Caerano. They held influential positions as, respectively, protonotary, cardinal (and the
only cardinal who studied theology), preacher and author, prior general of the Augustine
order, papal librarian and master general of the Dominicans. At the same time, they wrote
influential texts and held important orations. These intellectuals were of particular import-
ance, both in writing and in speech, because they were also the chief orators at the Julian
court, be it as preacber in church or chapel, or at the palace. They gave expert advice to
julius II and Rapbael, in particular Vigerio, Egidio da Viterbo and Inghirami. Their com-
mon goal was to blend the three main elements: knowledge of the Greek philosophers
(known from later compilations, mostly codified at the university of Padua, and directly
from original Greek texts and recent translations into Latin), the grammar and elegance of
Latin, especially that of Cicero, and the wisdom of Christian theologians - a revelation de-
rived from Sacred Scripture, clarified by the Church Fathers as well as the scholastic au-
thors, and linked to the papacy in general and to julius If in particular.
Papal advisors tried to join universal wisdom and piety with eloquence, using newly ed-
ited texts of both classical and Christian antiquity. They ascribed divine inspiration to a
number of Greek and Latin authors, as well as to pre-Christian Jewish authors: Aristotle or
Virgil could be read as David or Isaiah. Like the words of john the Evangelist and the let-
ters of Paul, they were all inspired texts. Yet the pre-Chrisrian era did not have the fullness
158 HISTORY OF C.ONCEI'TS
FIGURE 11 Raphael, Julius II and his courtiers, fresco
WORDS. IMAl;FS AND ALl. THE POPES MEN 159
of truth and revelation, and therefore the Christians had to harmonize the Jewish and pa-
gan texts with what was canonized as the New Testament. Ever since Paul preached at
Athens and disputed with the Stoic and Epicurean philosophers there, the relation between
the Christian paradigm and the older ones had become a major intellectual concern. Dif-
ferent assessments of the relationship had been given by Tertullian, Lactantius, [creme and
Augustine, to name but the most important. In the early sixteenth centuty the papal schol-
ars felt obliged to reassess this connection, first in response to the new ideas and methods of
textual criticism, put forward by Valla and Poliziano among others, and larer by those who
subscribed in varying degrees to reformarion thought. Their view on universal harmony
was also criticized, especially outside rhe papal court.
Litteratiof Raphael's time could rely on a long sequence of earlier attempts to integrate
nearly all branches of wisdom, in particular pagan philosophy and poetry with its much ap-
preciated Latin style, and Christian theology which was considered superior in religious
content. Consciousness of style, textual criticism and the rediscovery of texts required
reformulations of the rraditional view of harmonizing the ancient and the Christian theo-
logians. Due to the new discoveries old controversies about the limits of harmony received
a fresh impetus. The Florentine Marsilio Ficino not only translated Plato - whose work had
recently become much berter known than previously - into Latin. He also commented
upon his work, constructing a very long tradition of prisci theoiogi, including Pythagoras
and Hermes Trismegistus among others. They are probably depicted to the right and left in
the background of the 'School of Athens' (FIG.12).jj The civic humanism of the
Plorenrines was transformed into an ecclesiastical humanism in Rome for which Picino's
Theoiogia Platonica served as a point of departure. His work became a source for scholars
from different places, all striving for unified and universal wisdom. Yet Ficino's treatment
of theology and natural philosophy as such was limited. He was not sufficiently outspoken
in the political and juridical implications of the synthesis he favoured for the papacy as an
institution and for the reigning Pope as a person. For different reasons Ficino and his con-
temporaries, such as Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (princeps Concordiae, referring to his
residence and harmonizing ambition), were helpful but not conclusive. Several scholars, a
generation or so younger than Ficino, settled in Rome, and codified a new paradigm under
the patronage of Iulius 11.
46
This early-sixteenth cemury world view, with roots going back to Paul in Athens, hap-
pens to be in remarkable accordance with Vasari's testimony regarding the fresco, which in
the seventeenth century came to be called the 'School of Athens'. This set of ideas appears
to be consistent with the interpretations in the prints made after the frescoes and with the
orations and textbooks by julius' chief advisors." Harmony between all branches ofknowl-
edge was at the heart of their thinking, and this was precisely what Vasari considered the
subject of Raphael's fresco with Plato and Aristotle in the centre. They were harmonized to-
gether, with their predecessors and with the Evangelists. Texts and images share, until the
1620s, the idea that this fresco also has a theological and biblical meaning, and that it does
not focus exclusively on classical philosophy, interpreted in a secular, non-theological way.
Vasari, Veneziano and Ghisi were probably correct. The figures to the left in the fore-
ground of the 'School ofAthens' may well be Mark, Tatian, Matthew, John, Luke and Paul,
160 HIS'l'ORYOFCONOYl'S
three of them to be identified partl y on the basis of the stones and their biblical connota-
tions. The 'Disputa' probably has also non -Christian scholars in the foreground, such as
the bald Varro and the bearded Seneca to the viewer' s left. The man, addressing a pagan
youth in an apologetic way, on the right hand side, may be Dionysius the Areopagite, con-
verted by Paul on the Areopagus, speaking to Timothy. Conversion is crucial to this fresco,
which possibly has Theophilus between 5eneca and Lactantius (PIG. 13),
48
50 Christianity
was introduced step by step to the pagans, Lactanrius - in the company of his pupils to the
left of Gregory the Great - being the trait d'union with the Church Fathers and the by then
well established Christian tradition. From left to right Raphael probably depicted on the
'Parnassus': Horace, Ovid, Pet rarch , Virgil and Sappho below Dame, Homer and Statim,
and, in the foreground, Ennius, Lucretius and Cicero (FIG, 2). This blending of the secular
and religious, antique and medieval, classical and Christian had many precedents, not only
in words but also in various images, where Evangelists, Paul and Peter and scholastics were
porrrayed together with Plato , Aristotle and Hermes Trismegisrus. All litterati who are de-
picted by Raphael in this Stanza surpass the boundaries of a clear Cut mono-disciplinary
c1assification.
FIGURE 12 Raphael , 'School of Athens', fresco
WORDS, IMAla,S AND AI.I-TH E POPE 'S )I,IEN 161
FIGURE 13 Raphael , ' Dispura', fresco
In 1504, Paolo Cortesi published his Liber sententiarum ad lulium Il PantMax, a con-
cise commentary on the four books with Sententiae by Petrus Lornbardus. " The book was a
success, because its first edition, printed in Rome, was followed by the editions in Base! and
Paris. In the prooemium, Cortesi argued in favour of integrating philosophy and theology
with humanist eloquence. A sophisticated literary form would contribute to theological
understanding, and Cortesi himself tried to blend classical language with Christian mean-
ing. In his introductio to Iulius Il he adds to his arguments in favour of an eloquent theol-
ogy that Augustine did not disdain the more elegant types of speech, and referred to Paul's
style and to Ierorne's grammar. He claimed that Christian theology deserved a polished
style, and that it was up to the reigning Pontiff to settle the remaining disputations. In this
way, the pagan heritage could be used in the best possible way, by interpreting it from a
theological point of view; at the same time professional theologians could profit from the
new humanist eloquence, and the increased knowledge of pagan poetry. This argument was
presented with an unprecedented self-confidence and in a style that would please the hu-
manists as well. Basically Corresis argument is simple: the Greek mathematicians, astro-
nomers, geometricians had their merits, bur lacked one fundamental source ofknowJeclge:
162 IIl STORY OF CONCEPTS
divine revelation. Thanks to the Church Fathers and the theologians since Lombardus, to
whom the title refers, it became possible, to place the Greek heritage in a proper perspecti-
ve, and make good use of it. Philosophia, Arithmesica; Geometria; Prospective, Musica and
Astroloyiahad to be seen in the light of Theologia, and this synthesis of wisdom had to be
formulated in a correct, Ciceronian style. His book was a success.
Subsequently, Corresi published De Cardinalaru, which aimed at a similar synthesis of
all knowledge. Corresi again cririrized the interest in the natural sciences insofar as it ne-
glected theology, and argued in favour of direct inspiration through Sacred Scripture which
was the fundamental source of certitude, as well as knowledge of the soul, the planets and
the elements.
Marco Vigerio presented an illuminated copy of his Decachordum christianum to julius
11, whom he praised extensively in his praefatio: 'Ivlio Pont. rnax. dicatum'. In 1507, a
printed version of this extensive text was published at Fano." Vigetio argued in favour of a
synthesis between philosophy and theology, making use of several metaphors of harmony.
One symbol is the figure X, similar to the Greek letter Chi, with which Christ's name be-
gins and the Latin letter that is analogous to the cross, as well as to the Latin number ten.
His book is composed of ten pans and the harmonious implication of this was reflected in
the title of this treatise which was to a large degree a commentary on the Gospels. The sym-
bol X was likewise used in the 'School of Athens': on the tablet with the theory of har-
mony, derived from the Greek philosophers. A young man shows the tablet to an old man
- the Evangelists John and Matthew - who did not invent the theory of harmony, but used
it. To theologians, as well as jurists, consanantia was a frequently used metaphor for the in-
tegration of texts, that, at first sight, showed differences in content. In this way the tablet
with its symbols of consonantia is a key to this fresco and the programme as a whole.
[ulius' favourite preacher Egidio da Virerbo or Giles of Virerbo conducted influential
orations." His arguments are similar to those of Corresi and Vigerio. In his treatise
Sententiae ad mentem Platanis. an unfinished commentary on Lombardus, Giles ofViterbo
had tried to reconcile Platonic philosophy with Christian rheology." In his Historia XX
saeculorum. also unpublished, he continued his pursuit of harmonizing Jewish, classical and
Christian rhoughr." In his writings Giles ofYiterbo tries to link all knowledge to the Sa-
cred Scripture and the tradition of Church Fathers and later theologians, while making use
of the pagan tradition.
In De anima uniuersaiis traditionisopus of 1508, Cristoforo Marcello attempted an elabo-
rate synthesis of philosophy, theology and rhetoric. \4 Similar ideas were expressed in speech,
such as his Gratio in die omnium sanctorion. delivered and published in 1511. Tommaso de
Vio used other genres as well, writing pamphlets that defended the Pope's authority. The
young Dominican wrote commentaries on the Summa theologiae of Thomas Aquinas, and
twO yeats later in 1509, on Aristotle's De anima. Like the others, he accepted the priority of
theology and linked this to a wide range of other themes, such as papal primacy.
Marcello and Yio were, in 1510, less influential than Vigerio and Egidio da Viterbo.
They too worked within the same papal paradigm. Tommaso lnghirami, also a crucial fig-
ure to the Pope and his artists, followed the same pattern, harmonizing rhetoric, grammar
and poetry in particular.
W(lRllS, L\lACES AND AL1.TIIE POPE'S MEN 163
In sum, many orations and treatises, all from the period of Raphael's frescoes, contain a
common intellectual message." The conceptual world painted by Raphael was present in
the new library that julius II founded. He created a bibliotheca secreta, consisting of more
than two hundred hooks, mostly manuscripts and some printed works. Among this small
but choice collection were several treatises that were dedicated to [ulius II himself, such as
Corresi's Libcr sententiarum and Vigerio's Dccachordum cbristiaman.
These books reflect the dominant way of thinking at the court of julius II, in which the
tone was set by a competent and self-confident approach to knowledge, ethics, art, religion
and ceremony. The leading scholars of the day firmly believed they had attained a perfect
synthesis of all that had been conceived before, based on empirical observation, arithmetic,
logic, grammar, and most importantly: divine revelation, the only way to redemption and
salvation. Due to this source of wisdom they considered themselves superior to the classical
Greek authors whose knowledge they combined with the higher insight of Christian writ-
ers, understanding divine revelation which was still veiled to the ancient philosophers, the
prisci tbeotogi. 'I,
The encyclopedic intellectuals serving Julius II claimed harmony of all knowledge, em-
bracing heaven and earth, history and the time that was to come. Past, present and future:
they were confident of their full understanding. From divine revelation on the one hand to
the politics of the papacy on the other, they were sure of possessing a monopoly on the
truth. Their texts were eclectic in that they synthesized almost everything that had been
written before into a system which as such was a novelty.
Later, unexpectedly, the works by Marco Vigerio, Paolo Cortesi and Cristoforo
Marcello, originally meant to be encyclopedic text books for the centuries to come, became
hooks marginal to the mainsteam of scholarship, and even fell into oblivion. Most of the
texts by Egidio de Viterbo and Inghirami remained unfinished manuscrips. The intellec-
tual climate changed together with the political position of the papacy. Connecting all
branches of knowledge under the joint aegis of theology and philosophy lost its attraction
to both philosophers and theologians: their paths to the truth began to diverge.
However, in the time of [ulius II theological and philosophical treatises - as well as po-
etry and commentaries on laws - were part of one paradigm that served a managerial func-
tion. The new papal textbooks - with titles, also for the chapters and sections, and usually
with marginal notes and an index - contrihuted to the ideology of papal primacy in the
world. Papal authority, in all respects, was personified by julius IJ, who was portrayed in
the room and was present there when it served its intended purposes. All elements came to-
gether in Julius II himself: painted and real. This was all the more Important because he
had to consolidate the Papal State in central Italy. Apart from the military threat of foreign
states, in particular France, julius was confronted with [he attack in the form of a General
Council, organized in Pisa, an issue that was addressed by Vigerio in a lost pamphlet, and
by Vie, jacobazzi and others. The portrait of Pope Julius II refers to this issue. The reigning
Pontiff blesses the author of his new DECRElALE, while on the adjacent wall a general coun-
cil of all the sages in the world, inspired by divine revelation, comes together. Concepts and
images show the Pope's superiority to the secular princes. In all respects, Julius personified
the new intellectual and political consonaruia or to use the Ciceronian concept, harmonia.
J64 11IS']'Of!.Y UF CONCF.l'TS
The synthesis of all wisdom, divine and human, that was claimed by the leading curial
intellectuals, changed only decades afrer it was formulated, published and visualized. Al-
ready ro Veneeiano, Ghisi and Vasari it had become difficult to interpret Raphael's frescoes,
to identify the persons and to understand its texts - in spite of the fact that they were close
to his world of thinking. Changes in the function of the Stanza della Segnatura and in the
political context also contributed to the remarkable shift in meaning that was to take place.
The room had lost its function as the nucleus of papal politics and the papacy could not
preserve all its 'worldly power', In a series of remarkable revolutions since the seventeenth
century, ideas on knowledge underwent profound changes and the synthesis codified in the
early sixteenth century fell apart, leaving us with its magnificent visualization by Raphael.
W'()HDS, IMAI;FS ANf) ALl, TIlE POI'E'S )"jEN 165
CHAPTER 11
Painted Words in Dutcb Art ofthe
Seventeenth Century
EDDYDEJONGH
The last decades have witnessed a heated debate concerning the meaning and hierarchy of
the twO main elements of works of art , form and content, particularly in the field of
seventeenth-century Dutch art.' The discussion has brought to bear a variety of view-
points, which, roughly speaking, can be divided into two tendencies. To use the two simple
designations which were employed with relative frequency by earlier generations of an his-
torians, in one, attention to the 'how' of the work of art predominates, while in the other it
is the 'what' that marrers . For example, forty years ago Jan Steen's Girl Eating Oysters (FIG.
1) prompted the following consideration: 'We must remember that a painting as a work of
art is never important for the "what", but only for the "how". ? In fact, this was a credo.
FICURE 1 Jan Steen, Girl eatingoyster>. Maurirsnuis. The Hague.
('AINTED WORDS IN DUTCH ART Ol"JII ESEVEN' I'EENT H CEN' ('URY 167
The recent discussion has arisen partly because of the great success achieved by the pro-
tagonists of the 'what' approach, that is, the iconologists. The iconological method had
managed to clarify much about the meaning, background and function of works of an,
particularly seventeenth-century Dutch art. Naturally, there is no consensus as to how
iconology should be interpreted and applied. However, it can be said that those advocating
this method willingly look for the quintessence of the work of an in its underlying ideas
and in iconographic and cultural definitions.
Critical iconologists argued that one-sided attention to the 'how', that is, style, colour,
composition, proportion and expression, brings about a distortion of historical perspective.
After all, the seventeenth-century artist and his clientele themselves attached great value to
the subject matter of paintings, or even more, to what that subject implied in terms of sym-
bolic and cultural interrelationships. This can be primarily determined on the basis of cir-
cumstantial evidence. In his Nuttige tijd-korter I!OOr reizende en andere luiden (loosely trans-
lated: 'A useful way for travellers to pass the time') of 1663, the preacher Franciscus
Ridderus expressed an opinion undoubtedly shared by many, namely that 'paintings should
not be judged by the figures they contain! bur in terms of the art itself! and the nice mean-
ings.' 'Nice' should here be understood as clever or inventive..l
Fifteen years ago, however, the undisturbed progress of the iconologisrs was rudely inter-
rupted by the appearance of the self-conciously polemical book by the American art histo-
rian Svetlana Alpers. The an ofdescribing.
4
According to her, the meaning and the essence
of a painting must be sought exclusivelyin the visual means and their applications, and not
in abstract ideas. This is a viewpoint which is logically related to Alpers' conception of
seventeenth-century Dutch culture as a typically visual one. She considers the iconological
approach to the art arising from that culture to be more or less irrelevant. By drastically
sweeping away iconology in favour of the primacy of visual means, Alpers established a hi-
erarchy between artistic design and the content of works of art, which she regards as an his-
torical fact. I dare say that Pastor Ridderus, quoted above, would have thought that strange,
and in doing so I reveal something of my own view.
We do not know exactly what Alpers would say about Sreen's Girl Eating Oysters, but we
do have her interpretation of a masterpiece painted a few years earlier, a Self-Portrait and
vaniras Still Lift by David Badly from 1651 (FT(;. 2). Here I will only touch upon her inter-
pretation, as it clearly exposes the contrast to the obvious iconological explanation of
Beilly's painting.'
In Alpers' view, this picture concerns things which materially demonstrate their proper-
ties, their nature, analogous to what she dubbed 'Baconian ambitions'. The philosopher
Francis Bacon wrote: 'I admit nothing, hut on the faith of the eyes' - albeit after the ueces-
sary empirical experience. It is the rechne of craft, Alpers suggests, which enables us to un-
derstand nature. Baillywanted to show us a dazzling mixture of artistic creativity and artis-
tic illusion, an intention closely informed by Bacon's philosophy.
Even those who are not surprised by this claim and do not question whether Bailly was
familiar with Bacon'swritings, will at the very least want to know the meaning of the paint-
ing's ostentatious oanisas character. The many objects, including the skull and hourglass,
the air bubbles, the text from Proverbs (Vanitas vanitanun et omnia vaniras], together with
168 HISTORY Of COt"CfPTS
FIGUKE 2 David Bailly, Se/fportrait with uanitas still life (1651). Stedelijk Museum
'de Lakenhal ' , Leiden.
the two self-portraits of Bailly as a youth and as an old man, are difficult to understand as
anything other than a traditional statement of man's mortality.
However, in Alpers' view, matters are not so simple. The abundant references to mortal-
ity are supposed only to refer to the material of the painting itself. According to Alpers, the
actual message communicated bythe image is the display and enjoyment of craft as 'a ver-
sion of a Baconian experiment'. whereby the artist recognises only secondarily that his crea-
tion is subject to transience.
How to Read a Genre Scene
A few years after the appearance of Theart ofdescribing, a younger generation of art histori-
ans began to criticise iconology. While these scholars did not follow in Alpers' footsteps,
they too shifted the focus of attention from problems of meaning to those of design and
material expression. Some of them also raised objections to the premise of many
iconologists , namely that seventeenth-century art had a didactic and paradoxically obscur-
ing character."
A problematic aspect of the debate is that there are no seventeenth-century writings on
artistic theory in which the meaning of genre scenes, portraits, stilllifes and landscapes are
discussed in any kind of detail. This fact was not ignored in the polemic. If, as the
PAINTEIl WORDS II': DUTCH ART or- TilE SEVENTEENTH CEI':TL'RY 169
iconologisrs argue, the content of genre scenes and other categories of painting was consid-
ered so important by contemporaries, why - runs a favourite question of the critics - do we
hardly find anything about this in theoretical rrearises?"
An appropriate answer to this is, in my view, that the theoreticians concentrated pre-
dominantly on history painting, that is, on biblical and mythological scenes or on themes
derived from history and literature. They considered genre scenes to be beneath their dig-
nity or that of their profession. If wc bear in mind that genre scenes must have been made
in the hundreds of thousands, then such an elitist attitude tells us something about the dis-
crepancy between theory and practice; and at the same time also about the value and range
of our theory in this respect. The situation with regard to portraits hardly differs. Many
tens of thousands were commissioned in the seventeenth century, but the theoreticians ei-
ther chose to ignore the subject, or barely touched upon it."
What has been written on genre painting and genre painters in the literature on Dutch
art from Karel van Mander (1604) to Gerard de Lairesse (in 1707) would probably fit on
two, or at most three pages and is therefore negligible." How, therefore, could specific as-
pects of genre painting, such as representation and meaning, have received serious atten-
tion? It is often insufficiently realised that treatises on art theory are actually part of a rhe-
torical tradition and the tradition of poetics, in which it was not the custom to investigate
questions of content, such as the ascription of meaning to a theme or the inclusion of sym-
bolic elements. In this context, it is illuminating to make a comparison with Joost van den
Yondel's Aanleidinge tcr Nederduitsche Dichtkunue (Introduction to Dutch Poetry), a
literary-theoretical essayfrom 1650, which formulates a series of fundamental propositions
on language and style for the benefit of those desiring to become proficient in the writing
of poetry. In it, no attention whatsoever is devoted to subject or meaning, while in
Yondel's own considerable oeuvre the importance of just these two elements cannot be
overestimated."
Unfortunately, art history lacks a seventeenth-century treatise which places genre scenes,
still lifes, landscapes etcetera in an iconological perspective, as is done with personificacions
in Cesare Ripe's Iconologia. the influential manual for allegory, which first appeared in a
Dutch translation in 1644.1' Just as Ripa prescribes how an artist must paint allegories of
Generosity, Chastity, Abundance, the continent of Europe or Holy Rome, an imaginary
primer for the genre painter could have contained directions for how a particular amorous
situation could be depicted, which ingredients were needed to dress a specific virtue in
bourgeois idiom, or how mortality could be alluded to in the visual vocabulary of rhe
everyday. As rhis treatise was never written, no direct seventeenth-century answer can be
obtained to the crucial question of how we should read a seventeenth century genre scene.
Words and Images
The debate on the question of form and content does not convince me that the subject and
meaning of works of art were generally of linle relevance to the seventeenth-century painter
and his public. We have too much evidence to the contrary, namely motifs and representa-
tions whose communicative intention is difficult to doubt and whose semantic value is rea-
170 HISTOJlYOF CONCEPTS
sonably demonstrable. Of course, with the exception of allegories and the like, it can,
strictly speaking, seldom be entirely proved that the artist intended to instill specific mean-
ings into certain parrs, or indeed into his entire depiction, but in countless cases the prob-
ability on this point turns OUt to be so high that neglect or den ial of the message of the con-
tent would point to a feat of interpretation at of an 'art for art 's sake' bias. Furthermore, it
would be doing an injustice to the artists. for in the seventeenth century a part of the joy of
creation lay in the ingenious construction of the content and in references to matters out-
side the painting.
Nevertheless I would not want to give too rose-tinted a picture of the legibility of icono-
graphy. Seventeenth-century artists have often made it difficult enough for art historians
with exegetic ambitions. It turns our that many representat ions cannot be traced back to a
specific meaning, let alone a precise identification of their tone or mode, or the intention
of their makers. In addition. some works may have been delibe rately intended to be polyva-
lent. We simp ly lack a method of verifying this claim.I !
A representative example ofa painting about which various aspects can be explained, but
whose ultimate meaning, rone and intention nevertheless remains elusive, is Verrneer's Lady
Standingat a Virginal(Pu., 3). U A striking detail visible behind this musician is a depiction
of a cupid holding a card or a rectangular piece of paper in his raised left hand, and leaning
on a bow with his right hand. There are various readings of this derail, bur for the time be-
FICURE 3 ]ohannes Verrneer, A ladystandingat the virginal. National Gallery, London.
I'AINTFlJ WOR!)S IN DUTCII ART OFTlJE SEVENn:ENTl l CENT URY \ 71
FICLRF 4 Ono Vaeni us, 'Only One; emblem from Ono Vaenius, Amorum emblemata,
Antwerp 1608.
ing I am assuming that Vermeer derived the god of love from an illustration in Octo
Vaenius' extremely popular emblem book. the Amorum emblemata (Fu., 4).1; The print in
question shows the number 1 on the raised card (here actually a sign), while the cupid is
standing on a board marked with the numbers 2 to 10. The accompanying motto and
poem instruct us that it is allowed to love only one person. That is why Amor is demonstra-
tively waving the number I and treading the higher numbers underfoot.
Although the card held up by Vermeer's cupid is blank and the board with the other
numbers is missing, we can assume that in conceiving his painting Vermeer had the mean-
ing expressed by Vaenius in mind. Now, this hypothesis does not get us very far. Even if it is
correct, we are still ignorant as to Verrneer's exact intention. How, and this seems to me an
important question, did the painter want the moral he had included to function?
There would appear to be more than one possible answer to this question. Perhaps
Verrneer wanted to present the message conveyed by the cupid as a reflection of the life of
the beguiling musician. But it could just as easily be that he is holding up the moral in
question ro her for imitation, because her conduct left something ro he desired. A third
possibility is that the moral is aimed at us. the viewers. However, perhaps (this is the fourth
option) Verrneer was leaving all those possibilities open and the choice up to the beholder.
This choice could then be either unambiguous and equivocal, the latter case combining all
of these possible readings. Whatever the case may be, we do nor know what Vcrmeer in-
tended, any more than we can make a valid statement about the tone of his visual comrnu-
172 HISTORYOF CONCHTS
nications. How much seriousness, or humour or irony he may have woven into his repre-
sentation, or even how lightly or seriously we should interpret the moral, about this too
Vermeer leaves us in the dark. And we are not the only ones, probably. Another question is
whether Verrneer's contemporaries recognised the degree of ambiguities in his intentions.
In its refusal to be frank with us and reveal the structure of its meaning, the LadyStand-
ing at a Virginal is certainly no exception. That countless paintings are reticent about their
intrinsic meaning could very well have something to do with the general fascination of the
seventeenth century with the enigmatic, with ambiguities or partial disguise. Formulated as
an aesthetic principle and partly based on much older rhetorical principles, we can detect
this fascination in diverse literary writings, and occas ionally in art theory. I)
Unlike Svetlana Alpers who, as I said , regards Dutch culture of the seventeenth century
as a visual culture par exellence, and looks for the essence of sevenreenrh-century painting in
its surface, in th is discourse I want to emphasise what I would like to call the 'taligheid', or,
in German, the 'Sprachlichkeit' of the art and culture of that time. As far as I know there is
no such term in English, but the adjective ' linguistic' or 'linguistical' comes closest.
My interest is in art which somehow incorporates elements of language, painted words
or expressions. In principle, two patterns can be identified here: words which are illustrated
through appropriation of the actual letters; and words, texts , which have been transformed
and assimilated into the rest of the composition. I will give two examples: a Still Lift by Jan
Davidsz, de Heem from 1628 (FIG. 5), in which words are depicted in their literal form,
and a SelfPortrait by Rernbrandr" in which no letters appear but in which, if I am correct,
a word is visualised which is meaningful for Rembrandt. We will return to that presently.
FIGURE 5 Jan Davidsz, de Heem, Still lift with books (J 628). Mauritshuis, The Hague.
PAINTED W n ~ IN J)l!'ICl I ART OI 'TIIE SEVE:-J T EENTH CE:-JTUI<Y 173
However, we must not overlook the fact chat there are two sides to every coin. We
could easily regard manifestations of the linguistic in the light of the sisterhood of word
and image, of poetry and painting, which was endlessly proclaimed in sixteenth and
seventeenth-century Holland." This affinity not only represented a humanistic cliche
coined in Italy, it also reflected a real situation. In practice word and image were often very
close to each other. Many an artist attempted to wield both pen and brush and many paint-
ers were members of a chamber of rhetoric. And where seventeenth-century art is partly
characterised by a high degree of the linguistic, prose and above all poetry on the other
hand can sometimes be extremely 'pictorialisc' , a word that does appear in the English vo-
cabulary. '9
As far as the latter is concerned, with her emphasis on the visual in Dutch art and cul-
ture, Alpers has a point: the visual and the pictorial are after all closely related to each other.
On the other hand, she prefers to remain blind to the reverse, namely the pronounced ten-
dency to enrich visual images with the linguistic.
Picrorialism is particularly obvious in the work of a poet like JOOSt van den Vondel,
whose Introduction to Dutrh Poetry has already been referred to. In the course of his long ca-
reer, Vondel repeatedly made use, with apparent pleasure, of technical painting terms in his
descriptions of nature, for exampie. zo He presented his f rst drama Pascba as a
'living-beauriful-fine painting' ." Later, he was inspired by a painting by Jan Pynas to write
the tragedy joseph in Dothan(Fie. 6), whose final act in particular can be called a successful
example of his attempt to 'imitate with words the painter's paint, drawings and passions...'.
Drawing to be understood here as design."
FIl;L:RE 6 Jan Pynas, joseph's blood-stainedclothing, shown to[acob. Hermitage,
Sr. Petersburg.
174 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
With regard to pictorial ism, Vondel also wrote more than two hundred poems about
paintings and he was certainly not the only one to practise this specific genre of poetry. In
one of these poems Vondel mentioned the Frisian painter Wybrand de Geest, recalling rhat
De Geest had also been lauded by a Frisian poet; 'It is his custom to marry your painting to
his poetry,':" Such lines flowed with grear regularity from seventeenth-century pens and be-
long to the countless testimonies legitimising and perpetuating the sisterhood of word and
Image.
Also of interest in this context is the fact rhar in 1641 rhe translation of a Spanish novel
was dedicated to Wybrand de Geest, 'in which all the defects of the age, among people
from all walks of life, were punished, for delight and for instruction; and nakedly displayed
as in a painnng.?' Equally as fascinating as the comparison with a picture, is the double
definition of quality used here, namely that ir be pleasurable and instructive. To be both
enjoyable and elevating was the goal of all the arts in rhe seventeenth century and in so do-
ing it was possible to call on the universally respected Horace. His statement; 'He has won
every vote who mingles profit with pleasure' (Omne tulit punctum qui miscuit utile du/Cl)
was repeated ad infinitumwith and without variations." It is therefore not surprising that it
was usually on the level of the moral or the level of the deeper meaning - the 'nice mean-
ings' Ridderus spoke of - that painting and literature came closest to each other.
The use of the family metaphor (sisterhood) was one way of indicating the intimate rela-
tionship between the lirerary and visual arts. The use of a second phrase from Horace, ut
picture poesis, lifted from its context and, since rhe Renaissance, translated as 'a painting is
like a poem' was another effective expression of the same idea." Yet it was no less usual to
speak, after Plutarch, of painting as dumb poetry and of poetry as speaking painting." The
reader is undoubtedly familiar with all these cliches.
'W'hat is perhaps not so generally known is that rhetoric was also part of the game. A
good piece of oratory, we read in manuals of rhetoric, was supposed to be 'painted' in varie-
gated colours, wirh contrasts of light and dark. In rhetorical prescriptions, colour was par-
ticularly favoured as a qualitative designation well into the eighteenth century" In 1776
Sir Joshua Reynolds, for example, was srill proclaiming to his students that: 'Well-turned
periods in eloquence, or harmony of numbers in poetry C..) are in rhose arts what colour-
ing is in painting."?
Intimacy between word and image was nor always guaranteed. When the question arose
as to which of the two could claim to be the leader, animosity might arise between the sis-
ters. Competirion between the arts, also that between painting and sculpture known in art
history as 'paragone', was partially a realistic affair and part shadow-boxing cultivated by
the theoreticians.'O Leonardo da Vinci was already convinced of the superiority of painting
to poetry on the basis of the facr rhar painting served the noblest sense.'] In
seventeenth-century Holland, rhe treatise writer Philips Angel, in his Praise 0/painting of
1642, forwarded the same opinion; alrhough for him a deciding argument was the greater
financial gain, the brush providing mote rhan the pen."
Such considerations do not occur in the pictura-poesis literature, simply because there
visual and literary elements are strung together and there is no room for competition. Ex-
amples of this sort of literature ate illustrated collections of proverbs, illustrated broad-
PAINTED WORDS IN DUTCH ART THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY 175
sheets, illustrated songbooks, iconologies and emblem books, all produced by the ton in
the seventeenth century. The emblem book in particular, in wh ich word and image are
joined in the most pregnant manner, flourished enormously at the rime."
Although they were not usually published separately, this category also includes hun-
dreds of poems about specific pictures, mainly portraits. I have already mentioned Vondel's
two hundred works in this context." Whereas these are rexrs about depictions, there are
also many depictions of texts, such as proverb paintings for example. Famous is Pieter
Bruegel's painting of 1559, in which eighty-five proverbs and sayings are literally, as it were,
transformed into images (FIG. 7 J ~ We can find such transformations in many other paint-
Fa;uRE 7 Pieter Bruegel, Netherlands proverbs (1559). Staatliche Museen,
Gernaldegalerie, Berlin.
ings toO, though on a less encyclopedic scale than in the Bruegel. Usually this is a single de-
tail more or less emphatically incorporated into the composition, for example in a painting
by Anthonie Croos from 1665, a View ofThe Hague from the Northwest (FIG. 8), in which
the repoussoir at the right - a gnarled tree with a bird-nesrer - conceals a familiar
seventeenth-century saying." It is also illustrated in an etching by Claes janszoon Visscher
after a painting by David Vinckboons (FIe. 9), with rhyming caption: 'He who knows
where the nest is, knows it/ but he who steals it, has it' .v Nowadays we would say 'Posses-
sion is nine tenths of the law', that is. it is not so easy to get your hands on something."
176 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
FieURE 8 Anthonie Croos, Landscape with a view ofThe Hague (1665). Musee des
Augustins, Toulouse.
F](;URE 9 Claes [ansz, Visscher, etching after David Vinckboons, The birds-nester.
PAINTED WORDS IN DUTCH ART OF THE .sEVFNTH.NTH CENTURY 177
Many seventeenth-century paintings include details which turn out to be no more than
accurate visual translations of texts or words. The viewer was expected to distil the word
from the image as it were, that is, to decode it: a mental activity which must have contrib-
uted to his aesthetic experience.
I suspect that Rernbrandr indulged in this practice as well. In the 1656 inventory of his
possessions is mentioned a work described as 'a bitrern, after life, by Rernbrandt'r'" This is
almost certainly the Se'lportrait with Bittern (FIG. 10) of 1639, a portrait which in our
time has been variously interpreted in terms of eroticism, social status, vanitas and natural
ingenuity." Traditionally, imagination was considered part of that ingenuity. The latter is
in keeping with what I would like to add to this bouquet of interpretations, that is, the pos-
sibiliry of a Rernbrandtian pun, which incidentally does not necessarily exclude other con-
notations,
rlCURE 10 Rembrandt van Rijn , Se/fportrait with a dead bit/ern (1639).
Gemaldegaleric, Dresden.
'A bittern, after life'; in seventeenth-century Dutch, the bittern was called 'pitoor'
(sometimes written with two t's)." The word 'pitoor' is very dose to pictor, the Latin term
for painter, and even more close to the Italian pittore. The words, especially pitoor and
pit/ore are also quite sirnular in pronunciation. That for this unusual portrait Rembrandt
chose this particular bird and emphasizes it through lighting and positioning, is probably
less a coincidence than it would appear.
Naturally, this piroor-pirrore-picror association is of trifling importance, but it would be
incorrect to claim that an artist of Rernbrandr's quality would feel himself above such
things. It would be difficult to overestimate the status enjoyed by puns and visualisations of
words in the seventeenth century. It was only in the twentieth century that punning came
to be considered the lowest level of wit.
17R IIlSTORY 0 F CONCl'I"l'S
A consummate master in this respect was jan Steen (FK;. 11, 12). Considering the na-
ture of seventeenth-century humour, we can assume that Sceens saucy pum and expres-
sions casr in visual motifs were highly appreciated. His visualisation of an obscene expres-
sion about the filling of a tobacco pipe as an allusion to coitus is a typical example of this
genre. Steen repeated the joke a number of times, just as he more than once played visual
games with the ambiguity of the word ' kous', which apart from a stocking can also refer to
the female sexual organs." Other artists amused the public in a similar way with stockings,
Fir;URE 11 Jan Steen, The interiorofan inn. National Gallery, London.
FIGURE 12 Jan Scecn, Woman at her toilet. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.
PAINTED WORDS IN DUTCH ART ~ T HE SEVENTEEI-:TIl CENTCRY 179
FI(;URE 13 Adriaen van de Venne, 'Geckie met de kous'; Muzeum Narodowe, Warsaw.
for example Adriaen van de Venne (FIe ;. 13) and, later in the century, Cornelis Dusart in a
watercolour showing a Lascivious couple (Frc. 14), in which we see the woman demonstra-
tively waving the garment in question."
FICURE 14 Cornelis Dusart, Lasciviouscouple (1687, watercolour). British Museum,
London.
180 ! IlSTORY or-COKCEPTS
While this SOft of titillating joking abounded in seventeenth-century art, virtue was
preached incessantly and could also be translated from one medium to the other, from
word to image. An example of visualised rectitude is found in a 1679 ramilyportrait of the
children of a Leiden burgomaster by Daniel Mytens 1I (FIG. 15) .14 It is completely based on
Ripa's Iconologia, the standard allegorical guide mentioned earlier, which included both
texts and accompanying illustrations, which in themselves are already abstractions made
concrete.
Fj(;URE 15 Daniel Mytens II, Family portrait (1679). Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
Nine children an: posed before a park-like background with a round temple and several
free-standing columns, one of which is draped by a voluminous red curtain; a tenth child
hovers as an angel above the group, indicating that it is dead . The scene's unrealistic charac-
ter is accentuated by the children's colourful costumes, which bear little resemblance to
contemporary fashion, as well as by some of their accoutrements. Each of the figures ap-
pears to represent a specific virtue, making this family portrait simultaneously an allegori-
cal tableau. It is a matter of some conjecture whether the iconographic programme, which
must have been developed by the patron - undoubtedly the Leiden burgomaster - in coo-
I A I ~ T I [ WORDS I ~ DUTCH ART OF THEWVENTEENTH CEl-nURY 18 \
junction with the painter, was intended as an exhortation for the children to adopt the rel-
evant virtues, or if it was meant to suggest that the offspring already exemplified the com-
bined ethic.
I will refrain from giving an inventory of all the concepts and motifs derived from Ripa:
after all, the necessary liberties were sometimes taken . Everything which was too obviously
unrealistic was left out. As parspro toto, I will only show Temperance and Constancy (FIe.
16, 17): two of Rips's personifications which are imitated by the sitting girl with the bridle
(but without Ripa's elephant), and the standing girl to the far right, who grasps a pillar and
holds a sword above a fire. She is taken over wholesale from the !conologia.
H
FIGURE 16 Temperance, illustration from
Cesare Ripa, Iconologia, Amsterdam
1644.
FI<;URE 17 Constancy, illustration from
Cesare Ripa, Iconologia, Amsterdam 1644.
One could claim that the process of transformation in Mytens' picture is somewhat dif-
ferent since the people portrayed also had visual origins, starting in Ripa's woodcuts. On
the other hand Ripa's text was also used and tran slated visually, a facet that would lead us
too far astray to go into now. In any case, it does not seem exaggerated to me to characterise
Mytens' painting as a particularly ' bookish' performance.
Still Lifes
I would like to emphasise that not everything was equally 'bookish' or linguistic in Dutch
art of the seventeenth century. Just as there is enough seventeenth-century poetry in which
the painterly element remained limited or was even completely absent, naturally the lan-
guage content is not equally present in each painting. Bur whilst it can easily be shown that
182 HISTORY OF CON CEPTS
throughout the seventeenth century there were artists who had little interest in producing
images ala Steen or Mytens with visualised expressions or ideas, there were many painters
who enjoyed accommodating linguisric details into their compositions, which often led to
intriguing iconography, whether or not it was decodable.
As I have already briefly mentioned, two basic patterns can be identified in the use of
linguistic expressions in the fine arts. First. expressions which have been transformed into a
visual motif, such as proverbs, sayings. words , examples of which we have seen in Bruegel,
Rembrandt, Steen and Mytens. And second, expressions which have been left in their
'natural form', thus words openly imitated in paint, written or printed. We saw an example
of this category in the Still Lifeby Jan Davidsz. de Heem (Fig.5). orthe books displayed in
this painting, two bear titles and the names of the authors, Bredero and [acob
Westerbaen:
i 6
In the Dutch Republic with its enormous book production and high degree
of literacy, this sort of still life enjoyed an uninterrupted popularity.
According to Svetlana Alpers, words and texts in paintings, 'rather than supplying un-
derlying meanings', above all give us more to look at Y In her view, they are eyecatchers
which 'extend without deepening the reference of the work' . Indeed, the mise-m-page of a
text, or the contrasts between a fragment with letters and the rest of a painting's configura-
tion, can produce splendid artistic results, but that does not alter the faet that texts often
have yet another function. On many occasions they are added to lend depth Ot nuance to
the effect of a depiction, or to offer an amusing commentary on that depiction.
An ingenious painting by Gerard van Honthorst of 1625 (FIG. 18) is a typical repre-
sentative of seventeenth-century humour." It depicts a courtesan ostentatiously pointing
FIGURE 18 Gerard van Honthorst, Young womanholdinga medaillion (1625). City Art
Museum, Se. Louis, Missouri.
PAINTED 'X'ORDS IN DUTCH ART OF THE SEV!'.NTEENTH CENT URY 183
to a medallion with a nude woman seen from the back, her head turned away, sitting on a
folding table. We should probably regard the courtesan and the miniature nude as one and
the same person. Written under the nude figure is; ' Wie kent mijn naeis van Afteren' -
'Who knows my nose from behind.' The Dutch word used here for 'nose' is 'naeis', which
should probably be understood as a dialect form of rhe word for nose, 'neus' , with perhaps
a nod to the word 'naers' , which means the same as 'arse' i' "
Indeed, we cannot know her nose from behind and looking at her does not help because
she teasingly holds a hand before her face. A mirror on the table elaborates the joke even
further - her turned head also prevents her nose from being seen in the mirror.
Seventeenth-century viewers must have found all this very amusing.
A less daring variant of this humour, where word and image are once again artfully com-
bined and, moreover, supplemented with a moral , is an engraving by Hendrick Bary (FIC.
19) made much later in the seventeenth century. The standing man seen from behind bears
the following rhymed comrnenr. '" ' Who looks upon me fain would know! Who am I and
what I wear;/ But friend I am like he who sees me;/ because I do not know my selves.'
A moment ago when I mentioned ]an Davidsz. de Heern for the second time, I spoke of
several still lifes in which texts play a role, texts in what I have called their 'natural shape'.
With these stilllifes I will bring to a close my exposition about the painted word and it will
hopefully become clear that texts-in-paint could and do provide, not only visual pleasures,
but also intellectual information. This recalls Pastor Ridderus, whose standpoint to my
mind reflects the consensus at the time, namely the idea that painting is about both artistry
and meaning, which preferably should show some ingenuity.
FIGURE 19 Hendrick Bary, Standing man (engraving) .
184 ! lISTORY or CONCEPTS
5tilllifes with books, I have just said, remained popular throughout the seventeenth cen-
tury. The last quarter of the century witnesses some painters, the most interesting being
Edwaert Collier, who could not get enough of books and texts. I Characteristic of his style
is a Vanitas Still Life (Fi. 20) including a songbook entitled Cupidoos lustho/(Cupid's
pleasure garden), Flavius Josephus' History a/the Jewish \.%r, and a Dutch translation of a
then-famous book by the sixteenth-century French Calvinist Du Bartas, La Sepmaineou la
creation du monde. The meticulous manner in which the painter has depicted the three tide
pages, or perhaps we should say, written them out, shows a certain mania with regard to the
seductive sisterhood of word and image.
FIGURE 20 Edwaert Collier, Vanitas stil/life. Sredelijk Museum 'de Lakenhal', Leiden.
No less interesting in iconographic terms is a Still Life attributed to Collier (FIG. 21),
which includes a sculpture ofa cross-bearing Christ. This is not an invention of the painter,
but a rather exact reproduction of Michelangelo's Christ in Santa Maria sopra Minerva in
Rome. Books are also visible, including one that is particularly appropriate in our context,
namely the 1644 Dutch edition of Ripa's Iconologia (FIG. 22) . Here Ripa is not translated
into other forms and material as in jan Mytens' FamilyPortrait (FIG. 15), but faithfully imi-
tated in its physical aspects. The book is opened, not at all randomly, to the section on
Glory, Fame, Honour, page 441. The painter's meticulousness extends to the signature and
custos, or catchword at the bottom of the page.52
PAiNTED \'(lORDS IN DUTCH ART OF THE CENTL:RY 185
FIGURE 21 Edwaert Collier or Simon Renard de Sainr-Andre, Still lift with sculpture.
Whereabouts unknown.
FIGURE 22 Page from Cesare Ripa, lconologia, Amsterdam 1644.
186 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
Collier and his followers were not the only ones to eagerly embrace significant books.
Many other painters also incorporated primed matter wirh great refinement into canvas or
panel. An exceptional picture was that by [an van der Heyden, better known as rhe painter
of urban views and the inventor of the fire engine, but here excelling as a painter of valu-
able collectible items and two opened folios (FIG. 23). SJThey are, on the chair to the right,
the Dutch Authorized Version of the Bible, and on the table, an atlas by Blaeu, the Toned
des Aerdrycks. The texts have been included right down to the smallest typographical details
with striking precision, just as the map in the atlas of fortifications at Bergen op Zoom are
enormously accurate.
FIGURE 23 Jan van der Heyden, Still life with books and curiosities. Szepmuveszeri
Muzeum, Budapest.
The Bible is open ar the first page of the book of Proverbs which begins with the
well-known saying ' Vanity of vanities, all is vanity', a text which was depicted separately in
countless stilllifes, usually, as in those by BaiIJy and Collier, in Latin. In the case of Jan van
der Heyden, the choice of the book of Proverbs must be seen in relation to the unusual sig-
nature used here by the painter. It is 'old J.v.d.h. 75 years', which means that this master-
piece was pai nred in 1712, the year of Van der Heyden's death. The creation of such a still
life by a seventy-five-year-old, with such a steady hand and such precision, is an achieve-
ment of the first order.
l' Al:-.l TED WORDS IN DUTCH ART OFTHE SEVEl"TEl::K r H CENTl:RY 187
Conclusion
To conclude I would like to return to Holland's leading seventeenth-century poet, whose
poerica, An Introduction to Dutch Poetrywas briefly discussed , as was the fact that he wrote
many poems about paintings: joosr van den Vondel. One of his poems flgures concretely in
a Still iiftby Cornelis Brise (FIe. 24, 25). 54The work is signed with a flourish on one of the
depicted books, and dated 1665. Although it shows an untidy pile of odds and ends, the
sisterhood of word and image IS extravagantly celebrated in this piece where painting and
poetry perform an unusually effective duet.
FI(;URE 24 CorneIis Seise, Vaniars still lif (1665). Rijksrnuseum Amsterdam
FICURE 25 Cornelis Seise, Vanitas still lift, detail Figure 24.
188 HISTORY OF O )NCEi''rS
Even more striking than the elegant signature is the sheet of paper or parchment with
Vondel's verse, which in ten lines sings the praises of man's equality in the face of dearh-"
'Death equates both high and low
Middling and rich and poor just so
Dying is the common lot,
Bookish knowledge and marotte
Have equal wisdom in the grave.
The digger's spade and bishop's stave,
The bagpipes and the turban crown,
Are just as fair when life's laid down.
So let them bustle, those that will,
It all ends up by standing still.'
The last line of the poem, literally 'So staar het al ten lesten stil' (So stands it all, at long
last, still), has a gratification of its own. Given the seventeenth-century infatuation with
puns, allusions and double meanings, it is not inconceivable that there should be a play on
words here. One is led to think of the word stilleuen. still life, a new word at the rime."
With a fewsmall changes, Brisewrote out the lines from the poem entitled 'On a paint-
ing', which Vondel published in 1660 and to which he added the motto 'Sceptra ligonibus
aequar': sceptre and spade by death are equal made." We do not know which painting
Vondel had in mind at the time, or at least there is no documentation, but we can imagine
it, as his verse corresponds to a number of the objects depicted by Brise in 1665: book,
marotte (standard attribute of the jester), spade, crook, bagpipes and turban crown. In fact,
the engaging text implies that Brise's still life contains the same ingredients and possibly
looks like the unknown painting that had inspired Vondel to write his poem five years ear-
lier. It is highly probable that this unknown work was also by Brise. His Still Li[eof 1665
could be a variant or a replica, to which that extremely relevant poem was added with ap-
propriate pride.
One could argue that art hiscory as a discipline is characterised by a high percentage of
speculative statements and deductions. My elucidation of Brise's still life and the place of
Vondet's poem in it, is just such a speculation. We know absolutely nothing about the rela-
tionship between the great poet and the somewhat less great painter; if it is even possible to
speak ora relationship. This is how the art historian is - I would almost say -led astray, bur
what I mean is, how he is driven to speculation.
I'AJNTErJ WOROS IN DUTCH ART ()J' THE SEVENTEENTH CE"ITURY 189
CIlAI'TEH. 12
Historical Semantics and Political
Iconography: The Case ofthe Game
ofthe French Revolution (1791/92)1
ROLFRFICHAH.[)T
Using pictures to convey important philosophical, moral and political concepts was a com-
mon cultural practice in early modern France. Indeed, from the perspective of historical se-
mantics at least three major examples of these traditions can be distinguished. The firsr is
that of the learned allegories, a form explained and socially institutionalised in a long series
of emblematic treatises" beginning with Andrea Alciati's Emblematum libellus (1534;
French translation, 1558) and continuing right up to the Iconologie of Gravelot and Cochin
(1791) ..\ In one such example, the LiberteofCesare Ripa (FIG. 1) - adapted to the French
cultural context by Jean Baudoin in 1643 - Liberty is depicted as the sovereign of the 'Em-
pire of Liberty' (symbolised by the sceptre), while the cat at her feet and the Phrygian cap
upon her head represent her love of personal freedom and role as a liberator of the slaves,
respectively.' Ripa's Egaliti (FIG. 2), in turn, carries the symbol of justice - the scales - and
FIGURE I Allegory of Liberty, copperplate, in Cesare Ripa, Iconologie, 2 vols.,
Paris 1643, ]; p. 9
HI STORICAL SEMANTI CSAND POLITICAL 191
T
FIGURE 2 Allegory of Equality, copperplate, ibid., I: p. 54
the family of swallows supported by her other hand signifies the value of equal sharing. \ In
order to lend substance to the abstract key concepts to which they referred, the politicians
of the French Revolution drew heavily on these - mostly female - allegories'!' Their adapta-
tions of such images could be very creative however, as is shown by a study for a monument
to the Republic (Fx.. 3) in which the figure of Marianne is portrayed as the republican em-
bodiment of Liberty, Equality and Frarerniry.'
FIGURE 3 Study for a monument of the French Republic intended for the Pantheon.
Aquatint by Anroine Quarrernere de Quincy 1794/95,39,5 x 27 cm, Bibliotheque
Nationale Paris
192 HISTORY OF O N E l T ~
FJ(;L'RE 4 Allegories of the basic principles of the Enlightenment and republicanism, in
Francois-] ean Dusausoir, Liure indispensable aux enfrms de In Liberti, 2nd ed., Paris 1793-
94, frontispiece
Partly connected to that of the Emblemata was the more popular tradition of didactic
pictures. Wide! y used by the Catholic reform movement in the 17th and 18eh centuries,"
this practice was taken up by the revolutionaries, who adapted it to their own purposes, for
example in the form of republican primers and political catechisms." The need for such
publications was stressed by Lequinio on 27 November 1791, in the context of putting for-
ward a proposal at the Parisian Jacobin club that the prize-winning Almanacb du Pere
Gerardby Collet d'Herbois be illustrated:
You are aware of the ills that fanaticism has brought about by spreading pictures
throughout the countryside. I propose that the Society put all its efforts into working
to the opposite effect and produce pictures in accordance with the Revolution."
The Revolutionaries were as aware of the power wielded by pictures in the semi-literate so-
ciety of their time as their opponents. One of them put it very succinctly when he de-
HISTORICAL SEMANTICS AND POLITICAL lCOI'OGRAPHY 193
scribed pictures as a sort of 'spoken writing' (ecriture par/ee), 11 a comment which underlines
their connection to a semi-oral, popular culture that had, with the Revolution, regained
some of the importance it had lost through the combined effects of Absolutism and the
Enlightenment. I !
Examples of this politically motivated form of iconography can be seen in some elemen-
tary-school textbooks produced in the Year 11 (I 793/94). Aimed at children of the sans-cu-
lottes, these textbooks contained either frontispieces summing up the main political virtues
described in the text (Fie. 4) or illustrations accompanying each conceptually based dia-
logue. One example, the visual allegory of Egalite in the catechism of Chemin-Duponres
(FIl;. 5), goes beyond the uadi tional image of the female figute with the scale-beam in also
depicting the official axe used to kill the dragon of counter-revolution (an additional sym-
bol of her power), the figure of Nature (the foundation of equality) and the former privi-
leged orders fraternising with the Third Estate. U
The third pictorial tradition discu ssed here consists of social satires and political carica-
tures that were originally printed as broadsheets (Flc. 6) . Although not generally used for
this purpose during the ancien regime, 14 such illustrations became increasingly important
vehicles for political imagery during the Revolution." In the case of the complex concept
ofarisrocratie', attempts were made to convey the content of contemporary pamphlets in
concrete visual terms" by making use of the image of the 'arisrocrate' as a hypocritical, two-
FIGURE 5 Allegory of Equality. Anonymous, etching, in Jean-Baptiste Chernin-Duponres,
L'Ami des jeunes patriotes, Paris 1793-94, p. 30
194 HISTORY 01' CONCEPTS
FI(;URF 6 'The burial of fashion'. Anonymous, copperplate, 1633, Bibliotheque Nationale
Paris
faced character (FIe. 7) ]7, in one instance, and the idea of the aristocrat as the modern Ju-
das ISCARIOTTE
1R
(an anagram of 'arisrocrarie' ), in another (FIG. 8). The latter image is a ref-
erence to the 'cornplor aristocratique' hatched by a group of arisrocrars in early July 1789.
The socially 'mixed' nature of the new polemical concept of aristocratiewss expressed in the
form of a three-headed monster (FIG. 9); guided by the clerical figures of Hypocrisy and
Fanaticism. A prelate, a nobleman and a judge join forces in order to devour the people
alive - a pictorial rendering' ? of the modern concept of'feudal absolutism', auant lalettre. A
definition of 'aristocratic' taken from a conremporary pamphlet reads like a commentary
on this pri nt:
[She] has the claws of a harpy, the tongue ofa blood-sucker, the soul of a procurator,
the heart of a financier, the feet of a ram, the gluttony of a vulture, the cruelty of a tiger,
the haughtiness of a lion, the randiness of a monk and the stupidity of a judge; we have
experienced how she has sucked the blood of humanity for more than a century, how
she has eaten away at the harvests and hopes of the peasant, how she has devoured the
people and caused the greatest devastation in France.zo
Although they were created independently of one another, this conceptually oriented text
and the above-mentioned caricature converge to a remarkable degree . Taken together, they
represent a crystallisation in demonised form of popular criticisms of state and social con-
HISTORICAL SEMANTICS AND I'OI.JTI CAL ICONOGRAPHY 195
lA
,..., -..."..-., .". ""'w
. . . . ~ . . ~ ~ . . . . . . . .
IlJI
...... *' A.v._ ~ . . ~ .. 1"'"
., _ . er..- "-' 6 ......
FIGURE 7 The two-faced aristocrat - how he curses the Revolution and how he believes in
the Counrerrevolution. Anonymous, coloured etching, 1790-92, Bibliotheque Nationale
Paris
ditions during the ancien regime. The fancifully exaggerated imagery lends substance to the
critique while holding up the counter-image of the 'moral economy' of the common peo-
ple. The loathsome portrayal of the clergy, the nobility and the representatives of the abso-
lutist tax and judicial administration refers nor only ro the fact that they exploited the help-
less citizenry but also - and particularly - to the ruthlessness and insatiability with which
they did so; qualities that exposed the hypocrisy of the supposed ethics of their class (celi-
bacy, honour and justice). These accusations are poignantly summarised in the nightmarish
image of the multi-headed vampire gorging itself on the blood of the people - a literal in-
terpretation of the expression 'les sangues du peuple' in current use from the time of the
peasant revolts in the 17th century."
Thus far, the different pictorial traditions described above seem to correspond closely to
the modern practice of historical semantics. the primary objective of which is to study the
structure and evolution of individual concepts. zzAlthough the semantic fields
2
.
1
of concepts
such as 'arisrocratie' have occasionally been reconstructed." no attempt has been made to
seek out potential semantic dimensions beyond those in the immediate context. The im-
pression one gets from reading important texts is that, like mushrooms, key concepts" tend
to be found in dusters rather than alone. Is this impression misleading or does it suggest
the existence of whole sign systems hidden within the context?
196 HISTORYOf CONCEPTS
FICURE 8 The Aristocrat ss fanatical murderer and new Judas in front of his 'hide-out', the
Bastille, Anonymous, coloured etching, 1790-91,29,1 x 20,5 cm, Bibliotheque Narionale
Paris
HISTORI CAL SEMANTICSAND !'Ol.1TICAL 197
FrcURE 9 The three-headed monster of the Aristocracy, accompanied by Fanaticism and
Hypocrisy, devours the corpse of the people. Anonymous, coloured etching, 1789,22,7 x
35 cm, Bibliotheque Narionale Paris
Just as in the case of individual concepts and their semantic fields, iconography can also
provide an answer ro this question. A document which has been virtually neglected by pro-
fessional historians (FIG. 10) offers parricular insight in this connection. The source re-
ferred to is a printed parlour game which 'narrates' the history of France from the religious
wars of the 16th century to rhe promulgarion of the revolutionary constitution in Septem-
ber 1791. Although previously regarded as having only ethnographic interest, " this anony-
mous etching can shed considerable light on the problem at hand, as, by fusing words and
pictures, it actually represents a kind of 'hi story of concepts' . As simplified versions of the
game demonstrate (FrG. 11), it is based on a chain ofkey words representing the crucial forces
in French history, the order and significance of which correspond surprisingly closely to the
chain of definitions in a civic catechism." ln the enlarged version of the game, each key word
additionally functions as the title of an appropriate picture. In this way, the latter document
offers the historian an authentic system ofsigns that is firmly rooted in the social and cultural
context of l Sth century France. The historian does not have to reconstruct the system him-
self; to understand it he has only to ' read' it correctly. Nevertheless, before we do this - i.e. ac-
tually start playing the game - we need to ask and answer a fewpreliminary questions."
198 HISTORYOf CONCEPTS
FIGURE 10 'Instructive national game, or the exemplary and entertaining instructions of
Henry IV and Pere Gerard for honest and decent citizens' . Anonymous, coloured etching,
published by Andre Basset, 1791, 50,7 x 73,7 cm, Bibliotheque Nationale Paris
The Document and Its Background
The first question is whether this game might just be an isolated and unrepresentative case,
and therefore of no value to the social historian. The game at hand is part of an old tradi-
tion of jeux de foie ('goose games'), which are spirally ordered, word-and-picture board
games with geese drawn on some fields. Such games, which had existed since the Renais-
sance;" were in France particularly associated with the Jesuits, who used them for didactic
purposes.?" 0 riginally dealing only with biblical and ethical themes , from the middle of the
17th century they began increasingly to concern secular ones, as well: literature, geography,
French history and the topics of the day. Above all in the l Sth and 19th centuries, such
games proved an inexpensive way of combining learning with pleasure. They were popular
with both the upper and middle classes, with children and adults. Even though they were a
consumer item exposed to considerable wear and tear, more than 120 games produced be-
tween 1650 and 1820 have survived in the form of single printed sheets (FIG. 12). The pro-
duction of such games doubled in the second half of the 18th century, and reached an all-
time peak under the First Empire.
AND l' OHnCA1.!CONO< ;RAI'HY 199
FIGURE 11 'Diverting National Game of Pe re Gerard, or In the Year 1792 the Chicken is
put in the POt'. Anonymous, coloured etching, 1791,37,6 x 51 cm, Bibliotheque
Nationale Pari s
Thus, our revolutionary game is one of a series of products with a similar structure and
function. Where it stands out is in its high degree of politicization and in the unusual sym-
bolic power of its imagery. Before the Revolution, games dealing with French history did
not go beyond the fep rod ucrion ofstereotyped portrai rs of ki ngs and the obligatory listing
of their heroic exploits and military victories (Fie. 13) . Our game, in contrast, concentrates
on the political and social key-concepts and their pictorial-allegorical representation. These
characteristics are shared with Revolutionary pol itical prints in general.
Illustrated prints of this type were usually published in editions of about 1000-2000
copies. In Paris, they were displayed and sold in the streets, on the banks of the Seine and at
the Palais-Royal. They were aimed particularl y at the generally illiterate lower classes. Ped-
dlers purchased them in bundles of 20 ar a cost of five or six livres;ll individual sheets were
then sold at five sous a piece; a price within the means of the average Parisian artisan. Their
200 JIl S"I'ORYor COI\U:I'"I' S
20
16';0"9 70 79 'le 9" ::'0 I" 30]9
FIGCRE 12 Long-term trends in the publication of French jeux de Ioie 1650-1829
purpose was to inform the masses and win them over to the Revolution. In this respect they
can be seen as a central element of revolutionary culture and political communication."
As with numerous other Revolutionary prints, the fact that the game was used as a model
for various reproductions suggests that it enjoyed a high degree of public interest. In the cases
of two other historical games (FIG. 14), both shorter and far lessconcerned with political con-
cepts, only one version is known." Our game, on the other hand, was sold in at least fivesim-
plified versions at reduced prices." In these editions, not all of the coloured illustrations were
reproduced, but the complete semantic structure of the original was preserved (see FI(;. 11
above). If the number ofsuch versions is a marker ofsuccess, then our game was the most suc-
cessful of the ten Revolution-era jeux deToie of which copies have survived.
The game was published by none other than Paul-Andre Basset whose shop in the rue
Sainr-jacques was the leading source of popular revolutionary prints in general and ofjeux
de Ioie in particular. He and his successor produced about twenty such games between
1780 and 1860.
3
\ Basset skilfully adapted his wares to suit public tastes and political trends
- a talent which made him a rich man. This fact did not go unnoticed by his contempor-
aries: twisting the meaning of a contemporary anticlerical caricature (FIG. 15), an almanac
mockingly observed that the Revolution had not made Basset lean like the dispossessed
priest, but rather had made him fat like an abbe of the ancien rlgime.
1
(' However, Basset
himselfwas capable of self-irony, and in a print he produced in 1790 (FIG. 16), showing his
HISTORICAL SEMANTICS AND I'OUTICAL ICONOGRAPHY 201
FTGL'RE 13 'New historical and chronological game of the French Kings' , copperplate, by
Louis Crepy, 1745, Neudr. 1775,43,5 x 55 cm
shop with its window display, one can observe the two main ways in which his prints were
sold: while the lady behind the counter is waiting for customers, a colporteur, at salesman,
is leaving the shop, heavily laden with prints to peddle in the srreers ,
To understand what made this game so popular. we should bear in mind that our game
belongs not only to the genre of the jeux de l'oie, but also to that of the large-sized, pictorial
broadsheet - coloured 'posters' whi ch reproduced in simplified form varying combinations
of the most popular caricatures of the day (Frc. . 17), thus creating a kind of cheap mini-
ature gallery of Revolutionary graphics. Furthermore, the game's stage-like setting makes
use of two popular elements of French political culture. First, it is strongly influenced by
the cult surrounding Henry IV, the 'good king' par excellence." whose glory had been sung
in Voltaire's highly successful epic poem La Henriade wtu: was portrayed in numerous plays
as a national hero and father-figure," and whose anecdotes and 'golden words' continued
to circulate in many regularly reprinted anthologies right up through the first years of the
Revolurion." Two of the scenes depicted on the border of our game, along with their cap-
202 HIS[() RVOF CONCEPTS
FICUR 14 'Game of the French Revolution'. Anonymous, coloured etching, 1790,35 x
50,5 cm, Bibliotheque Nationale Paris
rions, are taken directly from such anthologies: in the lower left-hand section, Henry is re-
conciled with his minister, Sully.40 In the upper right-hand corner, he utters his famous
promise to provide all his subjects with a 'chicken in the pot' every Sunday." Another im-
age towards the upper left shows the affable king returning from the hunt and stopping in-
cognito at a peasant's hut - a scene taken from a play staged in Paris in 1791.
42
Henry ap-
pears once more in field 76 of the game and is generally portrayed as the leading figure of
an important epoch in French history.
Like Henry IV, the second French cultural figure whose popularity the game put to use
is also referred to in the subtitle of the original version: 'Pere Gerard'. Three other versions
even carry the name of the celebrated Brecon in the main title (see Fi, 11, Les Dilassemens
du Pere Chard. above). Michel Gerard was the only peasant deputy in the National Assern-
bl y43 and his pithy remarks in Parliament earned him such fame and popularity that he be-
came a favourite subject of comtemporary prints (FIt;. 18). The most widely read almanac
of the Revolution, the Almanacbdu Per Girardby Collet d'Herbois .?' turned Gerard into
a sort of father-figure whose task was to explain the Revolution, and especially the new
constitution, to the peasantry of the provinces. Our game had the same function.
HI STORICAL SEMANTICSAND 203
Finally there is the question of the the game's immediate historical context. When it was
published in either October or November 1791 , its purpose was to commemorate the ex-
traordinary fact that, after two years of hard parliamentary work, the first written constitu-
tion of France had not only been completed but had also been accepted by Louis XVI. Like
the political catechisms," popular prints (FIG. 19) and songbooks'" publ ished at the same
time, it was intended to popularise the Constitution, to contribute to the political educa-
tion of the people and to propagate the Constitution as a quasi-religious symbol of national
consensus and pride. After all, celebrating the new constitution meant finding a political
consensus: at the time of its promulgation. the radicalisarion of the Parisian sans-culottes
was just beginning, the Jacobin dub had split up and the republican movement had been
FH;UJU 15 'The priests of yesterday and today'. Anonymous, coloured etching,
1789-90, 22,5 x 18 cm, Bibliorheque Narionale Paris
204 HISTORY llF CUI\CEPTS
/.. r,kJ//~ J r
I'Jrc f ~ 1- ,)
FI<;URE 16 Andre Basset's shop for popular prints in Paris, corner of the rue Saint- ]acques
and the rue des Marhurins. Anonymous, coloured etching, published by Basset, 1791,
18,5 x 24 ,8 cm, Bibliorheque Nationale Paris
stopped, if onl y temporarily, by the' Massacre of the Champ de Mars' on 17 July 1791. By
its moderate focus on the Constitution as a symbol of common consent, our game had the
aim of bridging the gap between radical adherents and opponents of the Revolution, be-
tween monarchists and republicans.
A 'History of Concepts' of Social and Political Progress
Let us now put theory into practice, by playing a first round of the game. We shall start by
moving along the fields in their given order. The 83 miniatures - 83 was also the number
of French departements at that time - and their captions arc ordered in a linear fashion that
describes the course of French history. The structure of the whole is well considered and
skilfully wrought. From the opening field it is clear that the past is to be seen through the
lens of the Enlightenment and the Revolution: the beginning of history is portrayed as a
mythical, uncorrupted state of nature in which all men were created equal, an image that
recalls the opening line of Rousseau's Contrat social (1764): 'L'homme est ne fibre, et partout
il est dam les fers.' 47 Indeed, the image of chains being broken by the allegory ofTime is re-
peated on the border of the game. A rather radical cure for the ills of the time is depicted in
a revolutionary caricature from 1789 (FIG. 20), in which the old inequalities of the Estates
of the Realm are levelled with the help of a scale-beam: while the oppressed are finally af-
III STORIC;\L SEMANTl CS AND I'Ol.JTICAI.ICONUGRAI'HY 205
FICURE 17 The most popular revolutionary caricatures collected together on a pictorial
broadsheet. Anonymous, coloured etching, 1789-90, 81 x 72 cm, Bibliorheque Nationale
Paris
206 HISTORYOf CONCEPT:;
FiGURE 18 'Portrait of Pere Cerard from Lower Brittany, Deputy of the National Assembly
of 1789'. Coloured woodcut with transfer printing, published by Lerourmy in Orleans,
1790
HISTORICAL SEMANTI CS ANI) POLITI CAL I(;ONOGRAPHY 207
Fl(;L;RE 19 To the applause of the Third Estate, but mistrustfully observed by the clergy
and nobility, Louis XVI accepts the Constitution from Prancia . Anonymous, coloured
etching, 1790-91, 20,3 x 34, 3 cm, Bibliorheque Narionale Paris
forded the liberty to grow back to their natural size, the noble and the prelate, having be-
come toO tall and fat with the privileges they enjoyed during the ancien regime, are Cut
down to size with a saw. Thus, as the caricature suggests, the state of Egalite is re-estab-
lished by the Revolution.
This imagined Golden Age of French history is destroyed by Usurpation, Esclauaee; Igno-
rance, Guerres civiles and Anarchic. Thus, fields 2-8 mark the transition to the dark Middle
Ages and the Wars of Religion, while underlining the negative influence of the nobility and
the clergy.
In fields 9-16, Henry IV appears as a kind ofsaviour. His Bonte leads to a period of just
and solicitous rule in which the welfare of all is the guiding principle. Some of the mini-
atures illustrate scenes from the popular myth of the ban roi. It is no accident rhar the geese
commonly used in such games are here replaced by chickens, for they recall the king's pro-
verbial promise while symbolically redeeming it: a player who lands upon a field occupied
by a chicken is allowed to double the number of steps indicated on the dice and can
thereby progress more quickly towards his goal.
In 1610, Henry is traitorously murdered by Ravaillac. Consequently fields 17-33 form
a long period of Despotisme and Misere, of arbitrary rule by ministers during which the
Tiers Etat is exploited by the Clerge, the Noblesse and the Fermiers gene'raux. The illustra-
tions accompanying these catchwords deprecatingly refer to concrete historical events and
208 HISTORY Of CO:--JCEI'TS
,.f . ,Jt;,.,;..r I\T,..A-..... ,/rrnm/' ,."1.-..,, M.l ,lit ,v"'...." ."'IV kfwf;frri/"U"'''' tll' v"',; k..7Jrr <"IIIJ'
f ur "vrF., ." " . ,!.JJ.,,,I..llr .hty"d<"c . JfiNdr.-JNr: k '.J!Mr<" t; d ;" "'''!r''''/''' J-yrlR-Y
II

,.,11"" 111",,,.#,. n.."..r/k 'Mj'.>,/th:",t-'-!'-.r..1II ,tv _;"(".1' ""-/""Y,J..,l.wll.m ,JI'IQ ' .1_ . oh";' !;."'.,... to r:lllnl,f'II !m""""" ...
;''Y1Ur'" ".",1 /.. /"",.It:rl.
FIGURF 20 Society is measured anew. Anonymous, etching with contemporary inscription,
1789, 14,6 x 19 cm, Bibliotheque Nationale Paris
institutions associated with the ancien regime, including Louis XIV 's wars of conquest (20),
the imprisonments in the Bastille (30 and 31) and the John Law scandal of 1720 (33).
However, a new era is about to emerge - an event symbolised by its spiritual precursors
and representarives, Monresquieu, Volraire;" and Rousseau, the enlightened theorists of
Pbilosopbie and Tolerance. It is interesting to note that the history of France from the En-
lightenment to the Revolution is conceptualised in the game as a unbroken continuum: in
field n urn ber 41, a deputy of the National Assembly, resern bli ng Mi rabeau, carries the Mo-
saic tables of the Rights of Man of August 1789, which here appear as the direct realisation
of Rousseau 's Contrat social.
The subsequent pictorial and conceptual history of the Revolution concentrates on its
parliamentary, constitutional and military dimensions, carefully avoiding all reference to
the 'journies reuolutionnaires, The only exception to thi s is the (delayed) representation of
the storming of the Bastille (54). At thi s point, the game 's central themes are the principle
of the separation of political powers , the symbolic acts of patriotic harmony and the will-
HI STORI CAl. SI'MANTICS AND POLITICAL ICO NOCRAI' HY 209
FJC;URI::: 21 On 17 September J789 the wives of Parisian artists sacrifice their jewellery on
the Altar of the Fatherland in the National Assembly. Anonymous, coloured etching,
1789, 22,5 x 33,9 cm, Bibliorheque Narionale Paris
ingness to make sacrifices - witness the references to the festivities accompanying the
'panrheonisation' of Mirabcau (45); the first festival of the Federation (52); sacrifices at the
altar of the fatherland (47 and 72), which refer to larger prints (FIG. 21); and the personifi-
cation of Francia, dad in royal robes, carrying the Tablets of the Laws (49,50 and 60).
However, the Revolution cannot proceed smoothly; the path to the Constitution is full
of stumbling-blocks. Three forces are primarily blamed for these obstacles: the clergy, who
object to the nationalisation of their property as well as to the oath of the Civil Constitu-
tion (58 and 68); the Aristocrares, who want their tides and privileges restored (67); and
the king's brothers." who refuse to recognise the Constitution (57). These three groups
form the Contre-reuolutionnaires (66), who emigrate to Coblence in order to set up an army
for an invasion of France - yet another concrete reference to a contemporary print (FIt;.
22) . LouisXVI's secret alliancewith the enemies of the Revolution is revealed in his unsuc-
cessful attempt to escapefrom France on 20 June 1791 (63). Against this background, the
king'sacceptance of the Constitution three months later is looked upon as a victory for the
Revolution (65).
210 HISTORY 0 r CO:-.JCEI'TS
FIGURE 22 The flight of French emigres across the Rhine. Anonymous, coloured etching,
' Pub''. July 29 byS. Forges 83 Picadilly' , 1791 , 19,8 x 69,3 cm, detail, Bibliorheque
Nationale Paris
Some other historical games on the Revolution also end wirh this event (see for example
FIe;. 14 above). In this one, however, it is followed by 18 more fields which serve to open
up a perspective on the future. The message of this final part of the game is that the ideals
of the Constitution cannot be realised until a number of pre-conditions have been met: re-
actionary politi cal forces must be crushed, a goal that can only be accomplished when
Inconstnnce and Discorde arc replaced by Concorde and Amour du prochain and when the
Dauphin has become a true servant of the nation (67-78). This constitutional future (80)
is portrayed as the Elysian Fields, where, according to the accompanying miniature as well
as the print on which it was modelled (FIG. 23), [ean-jacques Rousseau already resides. <; 0
This vision of paradisical France also leans on an allegory of freedom drawn by Moreau le
Jeune for Rabaur Saint-Etienne's Almanac of the Revolution (FIC. 24).
The preceding explanation for the linear course which French history is made to pursue
in the game has more claim to authenticity than may seem justified at first glance. Ir is not
only determined by the hard historical facts to which a series of miniatures very obviously
allude ; it is also confirmed by a self-interpretation, written in both French and German, on
a simplified copy of the game (see FI G. II above). The following is a translation of the Ger-
man text:
HI STORI CAL SFMAN"I'ICS AND POl.l TI( :AL 211
FrGL:RE 23 The classical philosophers and Diogenes greet Iean-]acques Rousseau on his
arrival in the Elysian Fields. Copperplate by C. F. Macret after ]ean- Michel Moreau le
jeune, 1782, Bibliorheque Narionale Paris
THE MORAL
Equality was the natural state of man. But the stronger and more cunning soon brought
the weaker under their yoke, and Usurpation brought forth Slavery; this begat Stupid-
ity; the habit of Cowardly Submissiveness spawned Superstition, hence the Civil wars,
Anarchy, [and] Cruelty. This was the fare of all narions, as '(Was the lot of the West
Franks when Heaven sent them Henry IV. A most benevolent sovereign, he showed a
great love for all mankind and this, together with his respect for the Law and his
concern for the \Velfare ofall, led to a contenred Society. Treachery plunged its dagger
212 HI STORYOf CONCr.PTS
P/ /.
, ..
I1 vi rrt p r ~ millc ans ,
('hang; I' nos loix g'j'O .
F1GCRE 24 Francia welcomes Liberty as the new ruler of France. Etching by Jean-Baptiste
Simonet after Jean-Michel Moreau le jeune, 1791 , 5,2 x 9,1 cm
into the heart of this noble prince. His successor introduced despotism (arbitrary
power). Excesses and extravagances of all kinds were the hallmarks of his government
and court. A despot's obsession with Conquest brought this folly to a peak. Here lies
the source of the National debt which the Third Estate, impoverished by the great
burden ofTaxation, bore with steadfasrness and equanimity. The Clergy paid nothing,
the Nobility just as little.Those who could claim an Ancient lineage believed that they
should be free from all toil and care. By way of lntrigue this haughty and useless lineage
rose to Ministerial positions. They created the Letrre de cachet, the Basrille and the
General tax farmers, who plunged the state into Bankruptcy. It was finally Montesquieu
Hi STORICAl. SEMANTICSAND POI.1TICAl. ICONOGRAI'HY 213
HISTORICAL EPOCHS THE GAME'S FIELDS. CONCEPTS
Natural state Egalite
Wars of Religion U."iurpatkm' EscJaW1ge' ignorance seduction' Guerres
1559-1589 civiles Anerchie- Cnuune
1589-1610 Hctui IV Bonte. [oi Bien Public
Ahso-
Principles 'Irstusoa .
Espritde Conquete . Intrigue
---------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------
lutism
Guilty
Clerge Noblesse'
Ministres . Pemuers geniriJux
1610
Parties
----------------
------------------------------------------------------------------------
to
Means
PetitesMa.ison.i;. linp6ts . Lettre de cscbet- BastiJ/e
1748
----------------
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Results
Dette Nationale' Misere'
71ers Etat . Banqueroute
Victims
Enlij!;htenment Momesquieu . Courage' votteire- Pnitosoptne .
174S - 1789 Tatersnce Roussese Droits de l'homme
Events 14 luiJiet Feaeretion . Acccptstion
Persons Mitsheeu : Louis XW' Dauphin
---------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------
Principles Revolution Don pstriatique- Religion' Ftsnce
Revo-
Virtues Gloire' Vigilance
----------------
------------------------------------------------------------------------
lution
Autel de la petrie . Cocsrde netionste . Autel de
Symbolism
1789
t'tiymen . Citoyennes tamcsiscs
----------------
------------------------------------------------------------------------
to
nationale . Pouvoir Iegislstit Pouvoir
1791
lnsti-
rutions
judiciaire Responsebitite- Force armee . NouveJle
Constitution
----------------
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Opposing
Princes . DLt.4niJlation . Varennes'
forces
Coeue-revoksionnelres- Aris(ocrates . l.,{oii1es
[)jscorde ' .Inconst1nee
FIGURE 25 Chronological table portraying Basset's feu national; original headings for the
game fields are in italics
214 HIS'IORY OF CONCEPTS
6Hlouph;n:_ 78
6' !..om;' xvr'_ M
60. Resf'O"'ulnlW, l8

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15.Bi," publ,o
14./Aii:6l
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10.&,"'0
9 Hem; 'V:+
jO.P"""Oir jllicioi""J4,49._ 7S
55.Aut<l de I'hymen
j4.14Juillel:+; _74
HA"'" d<10pom',,41
52.Fode""'''"
5'."Jumd5
59
49.P"""'ir _ 7j
76
47.Don pal<;o'lquo;_ j3
'6.A<s<mbll< 73

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'l.Coume n..inn,lo
'l.Dmi" d<l'h,mom<:67

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M ACCI'f'laJio"'61
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81.Apothfu><
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79.I<fgt"b"'wn;44
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FIGURE 26 Schematic presentation of Basset's feu national: the valences of the game fields
in their given order and with their cross-references
LEGEND (EXPUl.NATION OF LErrER AND SIGNS)
normal '" field without special instructions
italic = field that a compulsory move leads to
bold " field from which a compulsory move starts
JE = compulsory move ahead ro numbered field
" compulsory move back to numbered field
o = compulsory move back to start of game
+ = The player receives payment
'"The player has to pay into kitty (cash-desk)
who had the Courage to pull at che curtainconcealing our rights; thespirit of Philoso-
phy spread over the land. Vohaire preached Tolerance, J.J. Rousseau taught us the
Rights of man. The enlightened vassal recovered his rights and assumed the National
cockade. The Revolution hach begun. The courageous Mirabeau rouses the majority of
the National Assembly with his eloquence, the flame of patriotism warms the entire
realm, the citizens offer up Patriotic gifts; Religion is returned to its original, uncor-
rupted state; Legislative power rests in the hands of the representatives of the nation.
France rises courageously to take its place among the other European powers. The
Federation of citizens of the realm is solemnly sworn in on the Altar of the fatherland.
HISTORICAL SEMANTICS AND POLITICAL ICONOGRAPHY 215
. ,
........ , . - _.&.IIIt . 6,..., , ,.... A ", , , .. r " "" .-.I..Jo, ,'-/41
. " 1._# .-10- , w. ft. .... .t ,.,., 1..1f",.I1 ... "..,..". .. , ' /.1 , ,._ ... "-'11"'" -- _ .... N.. __. , .._ .. .... -..-..
__ _ ..a-It.-...&I... _ ..c.. ,_ .._.. . . .--".__, ...._ .... " 0 _
... - . ....._ ..I .. .. . "'" -AA. . - Ir r.-Jh ....... . -......_ I..,...,-..J.h- .1. ......... .A". ,.J..r. 1\._
. .
FIGURE 27 'Demolition of the Bastille', Coloured aquatint by the brothers Le Campion
and Joseph Alexandre fils after Tetar, published by Andre Basset, 1789, 19,7 x 28,5 cm,
Bibliotheque Nacionale Paris
The 14th of July is a date that will never be forgotten in the history of nations. All
manner of chains are broken asunder and innocent victims who were destined to
languish in the prisons of fanaticism are brought back to the Marriage altar. Judicial
power, now organised, instils fear in the hearts of all traitors . The Prince s either dissem-
ble or utter threats. Vigilance thwarts their plots. Accountability holds the Ministers
within bounds. Louis XVI and the Dauphin flee. They are seized in Varennes . Love of
the fatherland reconciles all parties. The King's Acceptance frustrates the Counter-
revolutionaries' plans. The rashness of the aristocrats is brought to light. Monks sow the
seeds of Discord; Fickleness, which could return us to vassalage, is all we need fear. Yet
the Citoyennes of France, filled with the spi rit of Patriotism, wi11 soon teach rheir
children of the advantages, of the blissful happiness which flows forth from OUt Consti-
tution. The New pedagogy will shape the man of tomorrow. Harmony will hold sway
over all citizens; liberty will know no bounds; the Laurel wreath will be the reward for
great virtue; Fraternal love, which is demanded by religion as well as by the Consritu-
2 16 HISTORYOr CONr:Ei'TS
(
J7i'r/;nu. ,liul 7'lIllflolr 'fyi",(e.- d <:' rtl/lll u l
.La(lItU, ,{,utJ Ii. ltu/r.,f..r (lilt; Until",,, ' .r ,'
.;;: &u.t;tU ,/U<'.. (Tu,,1 ,
A t/ou: I'lL. aa/14 .re J'OIl . ,
FK;URE 28 Lacude, martyr for Liberty and former prisoner of the Bastille, also the popular
hero of a spectacular escape from the state prison with the help of a self-made rope ladder,
signifies the storming of the Bastille in a move against despotic repression. Etching and
stipple by[ean-Dorninique-Erienne Canu after Antoine Vestier, 1790, 13,8 x 10 cm
HISTORICAL Sf-MANTleS AND POLITICAL ICONOGRAPHY 217
1r'J'arm'J d ~ notrr mtlit'l"
n .n>nt I"'inl :lwr"rI-
k.r,. maiJ'ruLr.mnIrJ
~ n DtlJUpt/IVrcnoa
.n:rtoldm 'Ill 'ellln
oppeN ~ c ......
F)CL:RE 29 Conuulsionnaires arrested ar the cemetery of the Parisian municipality ofSaim-
Medard on the strength of lettres de cachet are incarcerated in the Basrille. Anon ymous,
etching, 1731, derail
218 IIISTORY UF Cl )t\CEPTS
FICLRE 30 Imaginary liberation of an aged martyr of the BastiIIe from the legendary
torture chambers of the state prison by the storrners of the BastiIle on 14 July 1789.
Etching and stipple by I. Hardener after Klooger, 1789,51 x 63,2 cm, Bibliorheque
Nationale Paris
rion, will turn the reborn Franks into a brotherhood; the executive power, enlightened
as to its teal duties, will follow the path of the Constitution; the Prince royal, shaped by
the Revolution's great example, will complete the Rebirth of the nation; a society made
up of virtuous people will be a Paradise on earth; this, and all possible welfare, arise
from the New Constitution.
One may conclude from what has been said thus far that the fields of the game were ar-
ranged in a well-reasoned, consistent way. This becomes still more apparent if we examine
the key concepts which caption the pictures, forming a chronological diagram of French
history (FIG. 25). In this diagram the negative periods and their dominant forces have been
IIISTORICAL SEl\lANTICS AND POLITICAL lCONOGRAI'HY 219
given a dark background, while the positive periods have been left white; this indicates a
progression from tencbres ro lumiires, from the 'dark Middle Ages' to the Enlightenment of
the l Srh century and to Liberte: an act of redemption brought about by man himself. Here
was a popular, open-ended history of secular progress, produced two years before the fa-
mous EsquisseofCondorcet, which is regarded as the first modern conceptualisariou of his-
torical progtess.
A Dichotomous Semantic Structure Intensified by Pictures
As we have seen, the chronological order of the fields of our game makes numerous seman-
tic relationships appatent. The Lettres de cachet, for example, are attributed to the Ministra
(28 and 30) and Mirabeau is presented as the leading protagonist of the Revolution (45
and 46). But the game is much more complex than this. On both sides of the board we find
rules describing compulsory moves that require the player to skip a certain number of
places, i.e. to leave the given order of the fields and to connect with more distant fields and
their concepts. If we want to comprehend the importance of these instructions, we have to
play a second round. This time OUt purpose is not simply to advance across the fields in
their given order but rather to take the various cross-references into account.
The game's special instructions are, of course, typical of the genre of the Jeux de Ioie:
various obstacles, as well as moves which serve to accelerate the game, were built in so as to
increase both the suspense and the number of possible moves. Thus, for technical reasons,
there are both favourable and unfavourable fields of special importance. This structure was
very skilfully used by the authors of our game to promote the dichotomous value systemof
the Revolution. This becomes more apparent if we turn the spiral order of the fields into a
linear one and divide the fields into two groups (FIG. 26): those referring to positive forces
and those referring to negative ones. The fields which are subject to special rules have been
marked by bold letters. All fields retain their original numbers. The numbers after the titles
of the fields indicate those from which the players have come or to which they must go;
pluses and minuses indicate that the players are either to collect money from the cash desk
or to pay some in.
The additional connections which the special rules provide between the key concepts of
different fields are all significant. Let us take a closer look at some of these semantic rela-
tions. A player who reaches the fields Lettre de cachet or Bastillc, for example, has to go back
to the start (30 and 31). If he teaches Varennes (63) he is called back to the Law (14),
where he learns that Louis' attempt to flee was utterly illegal. If he happens to get to
Seduction or the National Debt (5, 21), he has to pay a fine. If, on the other hand, he is
lucky enough to reach the field Voltaire, he is decorated with a Laurel wreath (38 and 75).
On the field Montcsquieu, he is even allowed to make three consecutive moves: first to the
legislative power, then to the judiciary and finally to the executive - a whirlwind ride
through the basics of constitutional law (34, 49, 56, 75). Revolution, for its part, clears the
path to Regeneration (44 and 79).
Although the above observations confirm the game's generally moderate character, it is
not without some radical views. These are directed especially against the clergy and the no-
220 HISTORY OI'CONCEI'TS
bility. The monks arc held responsible for the Civil Wars (68 and 6) and the Aristocrats are
warned to remember that they have renounced their privileges in the name of the Draits de
ibomme (67 and 41). Dyed-in-the-wool Contre-reuoliaionnaires are relegated to a mad-
house (66 and 19). This rapid alteration of positive and negative fields produces the im-
pression ofa world sharply divided into the forces of good and evil. This cannot fail to have
a strong suggestive influence on the players: a player who has been thrown back to the
starting-point for the third time after landing on the field Despotisme (8) will have learnt
for good that he can only win if he sticks to the positive values: the forces and proponents
of the Enlightenment and [he Revolution.
Semantically these reticular connections are determined by the principal meaning of the
respective words, which is to say that they are language oriented. By combining concepts
with complementary or opposite pairs of words, their meaning is intensified and their posi-
tion in a whole system of values is marked.
There arc also semantic connections of another kind, however. These are not verbal bur
visual, and arise from the symbolic language of the pictures. The pictures not only illustrate
individual key words {i.e. visually represent them) but also connect them to each other on
the basis of common iconographic and thematic elements. Their function is to expand
upon the meaning of the most essential key words through the use of pictorial allusions.
Though self-evident to the contemporary observer, these allusions must be reconsnucred
by the modern student. In spite of their having no concrete effect on the course of the
game itself, the suggestive influence of these implicit connections should not be over-
looked.
Ler us consider the three richest semantic fields constructed by this semantic iconogra-
phy. Firstly, France. One would assume that in a document commemorating the constitu-
tion of a monarchy, the king would be given pride of place; quite the opposite is true in our
game, however. Indeed, Louis XVI is twice humbled - through his unfavourable compari-
son with the idealised Henry IV" and again in connection with his arrest at Varennes -
while Fmncia; liberated from her chains at the beginning of the game, figures as the actual
sovereign. She, not the National Assembly, embodies Legislative Power (49). She, not the
monarch, wears the crown and keeps watch over the officials of the state (60). She and she
alone represents the welfare of the realm (50). Welcoming Liberty, Francia dominates the
central picture and presides over the game's final station.
Let us now consider the semantic field of the Basrille>'. It is true that there is only one
field with that title (31), the image accompanying it is a reproduction of an illustration that
appeared 011 several revolutionary handbills (FIG. 27) showing the triumphal demolition of
the state prison. The neighbouring fields suggest that the Bastillewas a product of the prac-
tice of the Letsres de cachetand an instrument of terror used by the General tax farmers (30
and 32). To conremporaty observers, however, the symbolic presence of the Bastille would
have been clearly recognisable in the miniatures of other fields as well: firstly in the figure
of the self-proclaimed martyr of the Bastille, Larude;" who is depicted with the rope ladder
he used when trying to escape from the prison (3 and FIe;. 28); secondly as a state prison
where innocent victims of despotism, like the 'convulsionnaires'>' in 1730 (Fie. 29), are
about to be incarcerated (18); thirdly as a locality where the first journie of the Revolution
HISTORICAl. AND l'OLlTICAL ICONOGRAPHY 221
Usurpation
3. Esclavage
Ignorance
Trahison
18. Despotisme
Petites Matsons
Lettre de cachet
31. BastiJIe
32. Fermiers generaux
Autel de la Patrie
54. 14 Juillet
AuteI de l'hymen
Concorde
74. Ltberte
Cttoyennes f r n ~ i s s
FIGURE 31 Semantic interrelationships of the key word Bastille in Basset's [cu national
took place (54); and finally as a dungeon where a very old man resembling the fictitious
'Comte de Lorges'" is being liberated by the victorious revolutionaries (74 and FIG. 30).
Thus, these visual representations link the word Bastille to the concepts of Esclavage,
Despotisme, Fermiers Generaux, 14 [uillet 1789, and Liberte; thereby underlining irs bipolar
meaning for the Revolution." If we now translate these findings into a diagram (FIG. 31).
It becomes clear rhar it is not the explicit rules of the game (marked by unbroken lines) but
rather its implicit visual connections (indicated by broken lines), that enable the Basrilleto
function as a directing concept - one that determines the meaning of the semantic system
of the jeu national.
The most crucial semantic pivot, however, and the one distinguished by the most varied
and numerous connections, is derived from the related conceprs of the Law and the Rights
of Man. These concepts serve not only explicitly to reprove the king for his flight to
Varcnnes (14, 63) and the aristocrats for their counter-revolutionary plots (41, 67) but,
linked together by the common symbol of the Tablets of the Law,"? they also influence the
visual representation of Intrigue (27), Regeneration (79) and the New Education (82).
Thus, once again, we have a semantic field (Fie. 32) with a bipolar structure that typifies
the self-perception the early Revolution, as well as its belief in having effected a major cae-
sura. It shows the ideological mechanisms used hy the protagonists of the Revolution to
justify themselves and their work.
It is vety significant that the three concepts of France, the Bastilleand the Rights of Man
are at the centre of our document in viewof the integral role they have played in the politi-
cal culture and national identity of modern France: the figure of Francia, as rhe vanguard
and embodiment of the Republic," the Basrille, as an almost mythological symbol of the
defeat of 'despotic absolutism"? and the victory of Liberty on the QuatorzeJui"er; and the
Rights of Man, as the value that was recognised as enjoying the broadest base of consent
during the bicentenary celebrations."
222 HISTORY Of' CONCEPTS
Apomecsedes Grands
hommes
._----
Societe
14. Loi

Blen public ,
,
J.J .kousseau
,
Droits de l'Homme

,
41. ,
Cocarae naIJonaJe
,
,
,
,
Noblesse

,
I
44. Rholution
L 27. Intrigue
rairaoeau
,
28. Ministres
,
Reli ion
,
,
I
49. Pouvoir
,
"=re
Dau hin
Vigilance I
63. varenees
I
60. Responsabilitl!
mour ce a atne
LOUIS A'
Prince
Mcines
1

---I
67. Adstocrates
ParadlS
Contre-revo unonarres

,

, ,
,,
:'
,
,'
,'
,
, ,
,,
,,
,,
, ,
,,
,,
,
, '
,'
,
,,
,,
, ,
,
,
,
,
82. Nouvelle Education
onsutuuon
FIGURE 32 Semantic interrelationships of the key word Droits del'Hommein Basset's feu
national
Conclusion
If one views this game of the Revolution from the perspective of the 'iconographic ancien
regime', it may to a certain extent be considered as the fusion of the three pictorial tradi-
tions that were briefly discussed at the beginning of this analysis. Its sign language is drawn
mainly from the rich reservoir of contemporary political caricature. These caricatures are
either combined with emblematic figures (e.g. the allegories of Anarchieand Gloire. fields 7
and 5), didactic-theological elements (e.g. the Tablets of the Law, fields 79 and 82) or rep-
resentations of clerical insrructions whose meanings have been reversed in the spirit of the
Revolution (4, 68).61 The allegorical intensity of the pictorial language thus achieved, with
its emblems and magical symbols, is characteristic of the graphic arts of the French Revolu-
tion as a whole.s- In this way, the individual fields substantiate and broadly elucidate at
least four points that are of basic importance for the history of conceprs.
[1] Because the history of concepts, as it has thus far been generally practised, concentrates
primarily on texts (usually by 'famous authors') rather than pictorial sources, a considerable
portion of the potential research material has been neglected. This is regrettable, since such
material would seem to be of some considerable importance for the study of socio-cultural
HISTORIC.Al. SEMANTICS AND POLITICAL ICONOGRAPHY 223
history. Indeed, in the few semi-literate societies of pre-industrial Europe, public commu-
nication and collective symbols united in a kind of multimedia process in which texts, pic-
tures and songs frequently worked together. As was shown earlier with the concept of
Aristocratic, as well as with the symbolic figures of Henry IV and Pere Cerard, the texts and
the pictures accompanying them did not operate as isolated, disconnected entities, nor did
they function on completely different or sharply divided cultural levels. In functionally re-
lating to the newly emerging public political life, the two were - quite often emphatically-
interrelated and mutually supported each other. While the primary aim of the texts was to
differentiate and theoretically substantiate concepts, the pictures often reduced the latter to
their core meanings. In so doing, however, they increased the social effectiveness of the
concepts by symbolising, emotionalising and popularising them.
[2) Aswc have seen, historicallyimportant key concepts do not only exist as abstract terms. A
person, event or place loaded with symbolic meaning can also be seen as the concrete render-
ing of an abstract word. When illustrated visually, general principles and catchwords such as
LiberteandAristocratic are, so to speak, 'embodied'; given an easilyrecognisable, standardised
shape, which makes their inherent potential for associating ideasand actions not only obvious
but palpable. One could say that such iconographical qualities are an important prerequisite
for the symbolic power and widespread appeal of fundamental historical ideas.
[3] When, contrary to the general rule, the 'fleshing Out' of an abstract idea is carried out in
such a way that, instead of remaining distanced and neutral, it signalises either emphatic
rejection or enthusiastic approval. the emotional charge - and with it, the appellarive po-
tency - of the illustrated concept is increased. For example, the collective experience of 14
July 1789 and its immediate after-effects became so deeply imbued in the term Bastille that
thenceforward the mere public denunciation of certain political and social conditions as
bauilles was an effective way of mobilising mass demonstrations and militant activists.v'
[4] Concepts that have been simplified and emotionalised through this process of visual
representation are certainly more widely intelligible than are abstract principles. They can
more easily be popularised and instilled in the minds of the common people. This is why
graphic art has played such an outstanding role in times of great social change, such as the
Reformation and the French Revolution. Both were periods when the ability to mobilise
the 'masses' was of paramount importance.
But our jeu de Ioie not only sheds light on the history of individual terms. Innocent of
any explicit notion of linguistic structuralism, the game already contains the foundations
for a structural history of concepts - something which isolated visual representations of
single terms do not and indeed cannot. This is an effect of the way in which it links more
than seventy pictorialized polirical-bistorical concepts, termini and names into an ingen-
ious web of meaning. This is accomplished in a threefold manner: firstly, in a general way,
by rneans of the chronological-causal interlocking of the game fields; secondly, and more
specifically, by prescribing further connections beyond those of the simple linear ordering
of the game fields (see above FIC. 26) in the cases of some particularly important and dis-
puted terms; and thirdly rhrough the iconographic and thematic relationships among the
accompanying pictures. If one understands all the connections governed by the rules of the
game as semantic relationships - and with respect to this document, this is by no means an
224 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
anachronistic view -, then a tightly meshed net of terms becomes visible. Within this con-
struct, certain highly allusive key concepts form especially important nodes. Furthermore,
within the immediate area of influence of single terms, associations often overlap (e.g.
Tolerance suggests both Rousseau and Voltaire; fields 38, 39 and 40). Such a synthetic
viewpoint probably more closely approximates the structure and functioning of historical
semantics than do lexical or emblematic attempts at standardization, which imply a seman-
tic autarchy and virtually static unequivocaliry of artificially isolated concepts. In opposi-
tion to this, our game teaches at least the following:
[a] That semantic formations and networks of historical terms and pictures are not a con-
struct of modem linguists and semiologists. but rather something that was inherent in
the way in which late l Srh century France viewed itself. It was above all within the
frameworks of these structures, and to a lesser degree in the form of single concepts and
emblems, that verbal and iconic elements were able to develop and become a part of the
collective consciousness.
lbl That such semantic networks of meaning comprised of words and pictures are not
'democratically' structured: the symbols involved do in fact differ quite decidedly in
value. To put it more simply, one has to differentiate between richly allusive and influen-
tial key concepts, on the one hand, and the secondary concepts with which they are re-
ciprocally connected, on the other.
[cl That historical concepts do not develop their suggestive potential and public appeal in
isolation but rather together with concepts - both complementary and antithetical -
with which they form common semantic fields. So it is that in OUt game, the AristocYatn
are characterised by their immediate 'neighbours', the Corure-raolsaionnaires and the
Moines, on the one hand, and, on the other, by the antithesis of their privileges and elit-
ist claims, the Droits del'homme(66-68 and 41).
[d] That semantic sign systems are by no means fixed, virtually static constructs, but con-
tain an inner dynamic owing to the reciprocity of key, complementary and antithetical
concepts. This applies to single semantic fields as well as to relationships among several
such fields.
[e] That, from the perspective of the history of concepts, key concepts of a general nature
are anything but precise and unequivocal. They are distinguished instead rather by their
wide range of meaning and by a certain ambiguity which can make them attractive even
to completely opposed political and social groupings. For example, in l Srh century
France, the term Bastille initially signified Despotisme alone; only when it received its ad-
ditional meaning of Liberte on 14 July 1794 (see FIG. 31 above) did it assume the charac-
ter of a semantically bipolar catchword. Bastille was now a word that both followers and
opponents of the Revolution could use against each other.
[f] That semantic dynamics and ambiguity are at once a prerequisite for and an expression
of the logomachy and pictorial struggle which different socio-political groups waged
around these concepts and symbols. It was the aim of each party to establish and fix
their content to suit their respective purposes.
IlISTORICAI.SFMANT1CS AND POLITICAL ICONOCRAI'HI' 225
Our jeu de foie is therefore instructive in a way that goes beyond the cultural history of
early modern and revolutionary France. With its network of words and pictures, it makes
basic structural features of historical semantics visible. Admittedly, they are features which
historians of concepts may sometimes intuit but often cannot support directly with docu-
mentary evidence. The analysis of this unique document could provide a starting point for
the recognition of pictures as an integral part of the history of concepts. It might also serve
to encourage what have until now been rather cautious attempts at a historical, structurally
oriented, semantic analysis of whole fields and networks of concepts.
226 HISTORY CONCEPTS
EP1I,OGUE
Between Cambridge andHeidelberg.
Concepts, Languages and Images in
Intellectual History
MARTIN VAN GELDEREN
In November 1595, the States of Holland contributed a subsidy for the commission of a
new stained glass window for the church in Wassenaar. The States decided that the
Wassenaar window, to be placed in the top position of the church, should represent 'the
garden of Holland'.' The motif was popular, featured on coins, in engravings, paintings
and stained glass. It became part of a series of standard images which formed the patriotic
iconology of the new Dutch Republic. In 1596 Holland's senior town, Dordrecht, hon-
oured the St. Janschurch in Gouda with a window featuring all the conventional elements
of the representation of the 'garden of Holland'." The window shows the virgin of
Dordrecht, seated in a garden, holding a palm branch. The flourishing garden, full of flow-
ers, is enclosed by a carefully plashed fence. Garden and fence are situated in a classical tri-
umphal arch, which is surrounded by the cardinal virtues Wisdom (top left), Justice (bot-
tom left), Fortitude (bottom right) and Moderation (top right).
As elsewhere, the image of the 'garden of Holland' was used in Gouda to represent the
triumph of the flourishing, free and united commonwealth of Holland, ruled by the classi-
cal virtues of good government. The symbols of garden, fence, flowers and palm branch
can be seen as visual representations of the political concepts of liberty, concord and pros-
perity which dominated the political literature of the Dutch Revolt. Thus the windows of
Wassenaar or Gouda can be interpreted as fine representations of concepts which were of
central importance to the intellectual history of the Dutch Revolt and the Dutch Republic;
illustrating that in the political culture of the LowCountries visual and textual representa-
tion were markedly intertwined.
The windows ofWassenaar and Gouda also indicate the intimate connection between
the concepts of liberty, concord and prosperity in late sixteenth-century Holland. Liberty,
concord and prosperity were, together with concepts such as sovereignty, representation,
privilegesand civicvirtue, constitutive of a political language which formed the intellectual
foundation of the Dutch Revolt and the early Dutch Republic.' In this language liberty was
presented as the political value par excellence, the 'daughter of the Netherlands', the source
BETWEEN CAMBRIDGE AND HEJDELBERG 227
of prosperity and justice. The Dutch Revolt itself was essentially interpreted as the defence
of liberty, threatened by the lust for power and the tyrannical ambitions of Philip II's gov-
ernment. Fortunately the political order of the Low Countries was the deliberate creation
of wise classical and medieval ancestors with the explicit purpose of safe-guarding liberty. It
tried to achieve this goal by means of a constitutional framework consisting of a set of fun-
damentallaws, the privileges, charters and customs of the Dutch provinces and a number
of crucial institutions such as the States. The functioning and flourishing of the ancient
constitution required civic virtue, including concord, from all levels of society. The shrubs
in the garden of Holland could only blossom if they were cultivated with virtuous assiduity.
This interpretation of the church windows in Wassenaar and Gouda raises questions
which have been central to the development of a Durch approach to conceptual history.
Between Cambridge and Heidelberg. students of intellectual history are wavering between
German Begriffigeschichte and the history of political languages as it is practised between
Cambridge, England and Cambridge, Massachusettes. The issues are manifold and com-
plex, touching ontology, epistemology and methodology in one stroke. As exemplified in
the contributions of Terence Ball, lain Hnmpsher-Monk, Hans-Erich Bodeker and
Reinhart Koselieck, at the highest level of abstraction the very nature of 'being' of concepts
and languages is at issue. This leads to a labyrinth of questions abour the relationship be-
tween language and material reality, and, by consequence, about the relationship between
political thought and action. In addition the interrelationship between concept and politi-
callanguage, at times verging on the chicken-egg banality, is a recurrent theme, entailing
doubts abour the methodological clarity and validity of both Begriffigeschichte and the his-
tory of political languages. Finally, as exemplified in [he contributions and of Eddy De
)ongh, Bram Kempers and Rolf Reichardr, the interpretation of visual sources challenges
conceptual history, the history of political languages and art history alike. Reflection on art
in history and history in art must start with the epistemology of visual imagery as a source
of historical knowledge and with wondering whether seeing images and reading texts are
similar andlor dissimilar hermeneutic experiences.
The Linguistic Turn and the Art of Interpretation
Friedrich Schleiermacher and Wilhelm Dilthey, the founding fathers of Romantic
Herrneneucics, built their theories of interpretation on the foundation of "humanistic his-
roricism"." The principal aim of hermeneutics W;lS to recapture the genesis, the
Konzeptionsentschluss; and development of a human act in order to arrive at its true under-
standing. This process of interpretation entailed an understanding of language.
Schleiermacher did not see texts as mere mechanical applications of given socio-linguistic
rules. Moreover, he recognized the Importance of linguistic singularity and of individualis-
tic innovation. Schleiermacher therefore urged scholars to move beyond "grammatical in-
terpretation" to psychological understanding. Language was regarded as the externalization
of ideas, as the medium of a "oorspracblicben Idee", of an idea existing before language. To
understand a text was to understand "the spirit which initiated and controlled (this) writ-
ing, and for whose representation the writing exists".'; Empathy was the traditional key
228 HISrORYOF CONCEPTS
hermeneutic concept. For Schleiermacher and Dilrhey a text was 'the "expression",
Ausdruck, of the thoughts and intentions of its author; the interpreter must transpose him-
self into the author's horizon so as to relive the creative acr" in order to understand the text.
Modern Begri}figeschichte and the history of political language have moved a long way
from the legacy of traditional hermeneutics. The linguistic turn, which has marked phi-
losophy throughout this century, has pervaded the humanities and social sciences for the
past few decades. From being a tool that we use to express ideas or to mirror reality, lan-
guage has been elevated to the 'medium in which we live',7The ontological understanding
of language as the house of being, das Hnus des Seins, to put it in Heideggerean terms, has
led to profound epistemological and methodological debates in intellectual history. As
Donald Kelly has put it, 'even the history of tideas", though it reaches out for the enduring,
must in practical terms trade in the cuttency of the transient- must start from and finally
return to the cave of human discourse'.'
Within their own historical and intellectual context Begriffigeschichte and the history of
political languages have been immersed in the linguistic turn. Begriffigeschichte endorses
and criticizes principal parts of Hans-Georg Gadamer's Philosophical Hermeneutics.? With
Heidegger and Gadamet themselves being involved in a philosophical Begriffigeschichte, as
exemplified in the Archiv fur Begriffigeschichte, the project of the Geschichtliche
Grundbegrifje 'originated in a style of historical inquiry that stressed hermeneurics and
hence the importance of the conceptual apparatus, horizons, and self-understanding of his-
torical actors'. 10 In many ways, Koscilecks theory of Begriffigeschichte is a deliberate attempt
to take Gadamer's Philosophical Hermeneudcs from its ontological and epistemological
heights to make it relevant for the practice of history.
Starting from the classical Aristotelian position that human beings are primordially so-
cial and communicative, Koselleck argues that society and language are meta-historical a
prioriwithout which history is inconceivable. Conceptual and social history have therefore
an interdependent claim to universality which subsumes historical sub-disciplines such as
cultural, economic and intellectual history.'! However, in the conception of German
Begriffigeschichte, the interdependence of conceptual and social history does not lead to
unification, as Koselleck insists 'that language and history be kept separate analytically, be-
cause neither one can be related in its entirety to the other'. While acknowledging the on-
tological importance of language, Kosel1eck claims, using Gadamerean language, that there
is more to the house of being than language: 'history in the actual course of its occurrence
has a different mode of being from that of the language spoken about it (whether before,
after, or concomitant with the events)'. 12 Love is a sympathetic case in point, as Koselleck
argues in his contribution to this volume that figures of speech between two lovers need
not mirror the love between two individuals." Just as love can not be reduced to the lan-
guage of lovers, so society can not be reduced to the language of its members. Conceptual
history must start from the ontological recognition of language and society as the (WO
floors of the house of being.
Intertwined with social history, concepeua! history 'is concerned with the reciprocal rela-
tionships between continuities, changes, and innovations in the meanings and applications
of political and social concepts on the one side, and large-scale structural transformation in
BETWEEN (:AMBR1DCEAND l l E D E L E R l ~ 229
government, society and the economy on the orher'.':' The creative tension between social
reality and language lies at the heart of Begriffigeschichte. As Koselleck explains this tension
in his contribution to this volume, 'the realiry may well change before its
conceptualization. Likewise, emerging concepts can instigate new realities'." The focus
therefore is on the diachronic study of processes such as Demokratisierung (democratiza-
tion), Ideologiesierbarkeit (the incorporation into ideologies) and Politisierung
(politicizarion) of concepts. The conflicts over the applications of concepts indicate Struc-
tural changes in politics and society. As language is constitutive of our 'horizon', of our
'range of vision that includes everything that can be seen from a particular vantage point':"
concepts also shape political and social change. I? The study oflanguage as agent and indi-
cator of structural change is the defining moment of Begriffigeschichte.
On the basis of rhe primordial [inguisticaliry and sociability of human beings
Begriffigeschichte has performed a major innovation in German study of history. Taken
from its Heideggerean heights, Begriffigeschichte was connected with social history. This
implied a grand departure from the traditional history of ideas as propounded by Friedrich
Meinecke whose Geistesgeschichte focused on the eternal wisdom of dateless ideas. At the
same time Begriffigeschrchte salvaged inrellecrual history, almost overrun by social historians
from Bielefeld and elsewhere who rushed towards a hard core historical social science, a
bistorische SozialwissenschaJt.
The formative decades of Begriffigeschichte coincided with the me of the new 'Cam-
bridge' approach to the history of political thought as epitomized in the work of John
Pocock and Quentin Skinner. Like Begriffigeschichte, the development of [he history of po-
litical languages started with the rejection of prevailing 'orthodoxies' in the history of ideas.
In his classicarticle Meaningand Understanding in the history ofideas Skinner rejects both
'textualism', with its claim that the text itself forms 'the sole necessarykey to its own mean-
ing', and 'conrextualism', insisting that it is the context of religious, political and economic
factors which determines the meaning of any given text." Although sharing the need for
departure from the old history of ideas as practised by Meinecke and Lovejoy, the philo-
sophical foundations of Begri./figeschichte and the new Cambridge approach are very differ-
ent. Whilst Begri./figeschichte was developed within the horizons of German traditions of
historiography and hermeneutics, the history of political languages originated in the
Anglo-Saxon traditions of Collingwood, the philosophy of language and J.L. Austin's
theory of speech acts. Thus Skinner rejects textualism because it fails to recognize the his-
rorical Iinguisricaliry of texts. Inspired by Austin and Wittgenstein Skinner argues that a
text is the embodiment of a particular usage of language by a particular agent at a particular
time.
For its part, 'conrextualism' fails to see that explaining why an aurhor has written a text,
is not the same thing as understanding the text irself" Thus, whereas textualism ignored
the historicity of human action, conrexrualism misconceives or has misconceptions of the
relationship between text and context. If the aim is to 'recover the historical identity' of
texts, the 'hermeneuric enterprise' of intellectual history should be guided by what Skinner
has labelled an 'historical and inrertexrual approach'."
230 HISTORY OF cor-:CEI''rS
In attempting to construct such an approach which acknowledges both the importance
of the historicity of texts and of the relationship between text and context, Pocock and
Skinner have both underlined the importance of linguistic and intellectual contexts. A
principal starting point for their approaches is the recognition that each political author
has to be sew, as Pocock has pm it in Saussurean language, 'as inhabiting a universe of
langues that give meaning to the paroles he performs in them'. 21 It is essential to recognize
the normative character of langues, of 'languages' used in political discourse. According (0
Pocock langues 'will exert the kind of force that has been called paradigmatic (..). That is to
say, each will present information selectively as relevant to the conduct and character of
politics, and it will encourage the definition of political problems and values in certain
ways and not in others'." Political theorists - and other likeable human beings -live in a
normative vocabulary of political languages. Political actors perform speech aces within the
linguistic and intellectual context of their normative vocabulary. The relationship between
language and speech act, between langue and parole should be seen in terms of a duality.
On the one hand the normative vocabulary enables individuals to structure and interpret
the world they live in, both in an empirical and normative sense; it allows them to make
sense and to evaluate the changing world around them. Thus individual speech acts are
generated, which on the other hand reproduce or transform the normative vocabulary in
general and one or more political languages in particular. The study of political ideas very
much becomes focused on the 'moves' agents make within political languages, on how they
endorse, refute, elaborate or ignore 'the prevailing assumptions and conventions of political
debate'" or, in other words, on how agents accept, modify and innovate political languages.
The history of political thought becomes the history of continua of political discourse."
A!; lain Hampsher-Monk points out in his contribution to this volume, one of the great
virtues of the new history of political languages is to emphasize human agency as the prime
mover of history, instead of the structures and processes floating through Begriffigeschichte.
History is the history of creative individuals who transform political language and thereby
politics, whose linguisticaliry is emphasized throughout the anglophone approach. How-
ever, in Focussingon 'how to do things with words', in emphasizing Wittgensteinean lan-
guage-games as the house of human being, English language theorists are in danger of fir-
ring Folly's description of philosophers in Erasmus's ThePraise ofFolly. To paraphrase Folly,
being caught up in the 'quiddiries' and 'ecceiries' of language-games, language theorists
may not be 'able to see the ditch or stone lying in their path'." In this respect attention to
the creative tension between language and society, as conceived of by Koselleck and as em-
phasised by Hans Bodekcr in his contribtion, is necessary for those who want to study
'ideas in context'.
At the same time, the ontological distinction between language and society, which forms
the foundation of Begriffigeschichte is deeply problematic. According to Kosclleck, 'lan-
guage and history cannot be related to each other in their entirety' because of [he 'pre-
lingusitic, merahisrorical conditions of human hisrory, such as time, the inner and outer
delimitation and hierarchy. W'hen the 'fluctuating distinction between "inner" and "outer"
hardens into passionate conflicts between friend and foe', when hierarchy 'leads to enslave-
ment and permanent subjugation', then, as Koselleck puts it, 'there will occur events, or
BE'IWEEN CAMBRIDGE AND HEIDELlIERG 231
chains of events, or even cataracts of events, which are beyond the pale of language', As the
Holocaust looms large over German history, Koselleck argues that 'there are events for
which words fail us, which leave us dumb, and to which, perhaps, we can only react in si-
lence'."
Koselleck's conception of history finds its classical inspiration in the works of Herodorus
and Thucydides. Its Leitmotiv is derived from Herodotus: 'There are some things which
cannot be explained in words, but only in actions. Other things can be explained in words,
but no exemplary deed emerges from them'." And Koselleck follows Thucydides in elevat-
ing 'the tension between speech and action to the central methodological axis' of the study
of'hisrory" At the same time Kosselleck recognizes that pre-linguisric conditions of human
history and the conflicts they generate are not only 'grasped by man linguistically', but are
also 'reshaped socially or regulated politically' through language." Thus, as fain Hampsher-
Monk argues in his contribution, the extra- or pre-Iinguisticality of politics and society is in
need of serious qualification. Social structures are linguistic structures: political action is
linguistic action. To recognize man as a social and communicative being is to recognize
man as a linguistic being. The history oflanguage subsumes social and political history.
In this regard it is mystifying why the ontological distinction between language and so-
ciety entails separate disciplines of the study of history. It is mystifying how the epistemol-
ogy and methodology of social history differs from conceptual history; it is mystifYinghow
the social-historical study of love is episremologically and methodologically distinct from
the conceptual-historical study of the same phenomenon. Love might be mote than the
discourse of lovers, and it may have pre-linguistic conditions, but for the loving historian
language is all that has been left. For the study of history language is the epistemological
house of being, because, as Koselleck argues in this volume, 'everything that belonged to-
gether in eventumay be conveyed solely through verbal testimony post eventum'.w As the
world presents itself through language, to quote Gadamer," the initial methodological and
epistemological puzzles seem to be the same for all brands of historical study. The ontologi-
cal relationship between language and reality is not JUSt a puzzle for Folly's philosophers. It
is also deeply relevant to the practice of all historians.
Practice
For the study of political and social concepts Begriffigeschichte proposes to employ methods
developed in fields such as historical semantics, linguistics and philology in creative inter-
action and tension with methods of social history It proclaims an interplay between
semasiology, onomosiology and many other 'ologies'. As a result, Begriffigeschichte has be-
come a methodological hotch-potch which is 111 serious need of clarification. With notable
exceptions, which include Koselleck, Hans-Ulrich Gumbrecht and some other authors
Begriffigeschichte as practised in the Geschichtliche Grundbegriffi is an old fashioned 'walk
across the summits of the history of ideas', to quote Hans Erich Bodeker.v In response con-
ceptual historians have sought to formulate a more methodical approach. One of the most
notable attempts in this direction is found in the work of Rolf Reichardr, who has set up a
list of guidelines, Arbeitsregein, for the practice of Begriffigesrhichte. Reichardr's guidelines
232 H[STORYUf' U ~ E I T S
concern the selection and social characterization of primary sources and the reconstruction
of conceptual fields, Begriffiftlder. Emphasizing the social nature of language and the interplay
between history of ideas and social-historical semantics Reichardt utges Bezriffigeschichte to
differentiate its sources along grades of social representation (soziale Repriisentativitatdts-
zrad), areas of practical use (Praxisbereiche) and textual genres such as dictionaries, newspa-
pers and pamphlets. To reconstruct the historical meaning of concepts within their social,
political and intertextual context Reichardt proposes to look at words and sentences which
define a concept, ar aligned words which add to, explain or differentiate a concept, and at
contrasting concepts (fimktionaleAntonyme) ..J'
Reichardr's Handbuch of fundamental political and social concepts in France seeks to
understand concepts as social norms reflecting and constituting everyday life in society -
from coffee-house to grand theory. The guidelines are focused on the recovery of the social
dimension of the usage of concepts. Reichardt's 'method', however, does not address, let
alone resolve some of the more fundamental issues concerning the methodological clarity
of 'practising Begriffigeschichte'. It does not address serious doubts which have been raised
concerning the discipline's conception of its very subject matter, concepts. Concepts ate
more than words, but how they fit between words, discourses, languages and vocabulary is
an unresolved issue.
As Hans Erich Bodeker emphasizes, in 'practising Begriffigeschichte' the focus has tradi-
tionally been on certain key-words, on title words with a costly neglect of semantics. By
consequence, as Bodeker argues, within the practice of Begriffigeschichte 'the discursive 111-
rerconnection of the individual keywords remains, by and large, without analysis'." In nar-
rowing down the study of language to the study of concepts, Begriffigeschichte loses sight of
rberorics, of strategies of communication and persuasion, which are essential to the under-
standing of communication as a social- and political- process.
The recognition that concepts need to be interpreted within the framework of dis-
courses lies at the heart of the project of 'critical conceptual history', which has found its
most eloquent pleas in publications of lames Farr and Terence Ball.'? As Ball puts it in this
volume, the task of critical conceptual history 'is to chart changes in the concepts constitut-
ing the discourses of political agents living and dead'." Thus conceptual history highlights
'the language - the concepts and categories, the metaphors and rhetorical strategems - in
which political problems are framed, discussed, debated and sometimes even resolved by
partisans of various stripes'."
Begriffigeschichteand history of political languages meet each other in the aims of critical
conceptual history. Noble objectives, however, do not necessarily entail methodological
clarity. It is as yet unclear how the methodological and epistemological horizons of concep-
tual history and the history of political languages can fuse. For his part, Quentin Skinner
has dismissed the very possibility of a history of concepts as such. In Skinner's view con-
cepts are Wittgcmsteinean tools, which means that 'to understand a concept, it is necessaty
to grasp not merely the meaning of the terms used to express it, but also the range of things
that can be done with it'. To understand concepts, according to Skinner, is to understand
their 'uses in argument'. The historical understanding of concepts requires an understand-
ing of their usage within a political language. For example the interpretation of the mean-
fll:Twr',EN CAMRRfDGF A:-JI) HFII)]'LBFRC 233
ing of the concepts of concord and harmony as used in the representation of the windows
in Wassenaar and Gouda requires an understanding of the usage of the terms which consri-
rure these concepts within the political language of the Dutch Revolt. To understand con-
ceptual change is to relate their usage within a normative vocabulary..l,!
Recapturing the normative vocabulary is for Skinner one of the basic steps in the process
of interpretation." The recovery of the normative vocabulary of political languages, is a
precondition for understanding what an author historically 'was doing' with a certain con-
cept in certain utterance, in a certain text at a certain time. The understanding of the
illocurionary force of a speech act, to use Austinean language, requires a complex process of
interpretation which includes recovering the conventional range and reference of terms, re-
lating the speech act to its social context and to the mental beliefs of its agent.
There can be little doubt about the success of the Cambridge approach as exemplified in
the series Ideas in Contextand the Cambridge Texts in the History ofPolitical Thought. Nev-
ertheless there is ongoing debate over the clarity of its methodological devices." One of the
issues is how to recover past normative vocabularies, past political languages. At this point,
conceptual history and the history of political language are involved in a language-game of
chicken or egg. Where the understanding of concepts requires the reconstruction of the
discursive settings of their usage, the recovery of political language and political vocabulary
must be based on an understanding of constitutive components, such as concepts. Concep-
tual history and history of political language may meet each other at a methodological mid-
dle-ground, conveniently described as the semantic field. To grasp the historical meaning
of concepts, it is necessary to study their usage in sentences and passages of texts, to study
how words, phrases, metaphors and rhetorical topoi denoting the concept are used in argu-
ment, to study aligned and contrasting concepts and to study structures of argumentation.
For example, to understand the historical meaning of the concept of concord in the Dutch
Revolt it is necessary to study the use of the words and phrases denoting this concept in re-
lation to concepts such as liberty and virtue and in relation to rhetorical devices mainly de-
rived from classical sources, in particular from the works of Sallust and Cicero. Likewise
the reconstruction of the political language of the Dutch Revolt requires the study the in-
terrelated meaning of constitutive phrases, concepts and key-words including liberty, con-
cord and virtue. Conceptual history and history of political language are intertwined in a
hermeneutical circle around semantic fields.
Images, Concepts and Languages
As rhe church windows in Wassenaar and Gouda illustrate, the representation and formula-
tion of the concept of concord was not confined to textual material during the Dutch Re-
volt. A full understanding of the historical meaning of concord must move beyond texts to
include the political imagery of the Revolt.
As Pim den Boer argues in his contribution, the history of Dutch concepts must start in
the sixteenth century when scholars such as Simon Stevin and humanists such as Dirck
Volckertsz Coornberr set up grand projects to establish, purify and glotify the Dutch lan-
guage on the classical models ofCicero and Seneca." The rise of the Dutch language coin-
234 HISTORY OF CONCEPT,
cided with 'the dawn of the Golden Age' in Dutch painting, to which Coornhert contrib-
uted as engraver."
Ever since johan Huizinga wrote his classic works on the culture of the Burgundian
Netherlands and the Dutch Republic, historians have esteemed Dutch painting in the
Golden Age as the hallmark of the Dutch nation, as the most glorious Dutch contribution
to European civilization." The importance of Dutch painting is confirmed by its tremen-
dous popularity in the Golden Age itself. According to recent estimates, between 1580 and
1700, about 6 million paintings were produced in the Dutch Republic. This implies a
weekly production of 1.6 painting per artist, on average. The wealthiest stratum of Dutch
society decorated its houses with no fewer than 53 paintings on average; the smallest prop-
erty owner still had 7 paintings, on average."
The interpretation of Dutch painting is an issue of great controversy. The past few dec-
ades have seen the rise of the iconological approach to Dutch art under the inspiration and
leadership of Eddy de Iongh." As De Jongh putS it, the 'iconologisrs' 'look for the quintes-
sence of the work of art in the underlying ideas in iconographic and cultural definitions';"
The iconological approach tries to 'decipher layers of meaning and literary allusions hidden
in painting and to relate the siginificance of genre painting to the classical concept of docere
et deleaare (to teach and delighr)." Emphasizing the Spracblicbkeit. the Iinguisticaliry of
Dutch painting, the iconological approach tries to decode the moral or humourous mean-
ing of images by relating them to textual material including emblem books, poetry and
ethical and political literature such as the works of jacob Cats and [oost van den Vondel.
The results of the iconological approach have been illuminating and amusing. Its most re-
cent highlight is Simon Schama's The Embarassment ofRiches which makes ingenious and
eclectic use of iconological devices to develop the thesis that in the face of the rise of com-
mercial society Dutch culture was characterized by moral anxiety,"?
The iconological approach is criticized from a variety of angles. The most strenuous at-
tack comes from Sverlana Alpers who rejects Dutch iconology for its 'reducrive view' that
subject matter, messages and meaning were paramount in Dutch art and that paintings
were merely means by which meaning and message are made visible." In The Art ofDe-
scribingAlpers argues that Dutch art did not want to make jokes or teach morals, bur that
it wanted to grasp and communicate knowledge through observation and visual descrip-
tion of the world in the greatest possible detail. Through a new SOrt of 'experiential obser-
vation' Dutch painting tried to vex nature. Alpers seeks to link the rise of Dutch painting as
the craft of observation with main developments in science and philosophy. TheArt ofDe-
scribing contains a lengthy and unfortunate attempt to connect Dutch painting with rhe
philosophy of Comenius and the empiricism of Francis Bacon. AI; David Freedberg has
pointed out, Alpers largely neglects stunning developments in Dutch science, such as the
publications by Rachel Ruyscb's, Judith Leyster and Maria Sybilla Merian which marked
the splendid rise of natural history through highly realistic illustrations of flowers and in-
sects. Merian's, Leyseer's and Ruysch works of art are in fact key examples of the links be-
tween artistic and scientific activity in [he Dutch Republic, giving credence to Alpers' the-
sis that the Dutch Golden Age was a grand visual culture whose motto was 'seeing is believ-
ing'."
IIFTWEEN CAMBRIDGE AND HEIDEI.BERG 235
The dash between the iconological approach and Alpers' naturalistic understanding of
Dutch an is nicely illusrrared by the widely diverging interpretations of David Baillys Still
lift from 1651. Alpers celebrates this work as a fine example of 'experiential observation'.
The table displays 'an assemblage of materials made by nature and worked by man' to re-
veal their nature: 'wood is shaped, paper curled, stone is carved, pearls polished and
strung'. In a Baconian way, nature is molded and squeezed 'in order to reveal her'.';! For De
jongh. Bailly's painting is a typical example of the vaniras still life. Objects such as the skull,
the hour-glass, the air bubbles, and the text from Ecclesiastes (Vanitas oanitatum et omnia
Vanitas) are abundant symbols of the moral statement that man is a mortal being who
should beware of vanity. ';.1
De ]ongh's iconological inrerprerarions and Alpers' naturalist approach have major im-
plications for the intellectual history of the Dutch Republic and the history of Dutch con-
cepts. Both approaches entail ambitious yet widely diverging interpretations of the culture
and intellectual heritage of the Dutch Golden Age. Alpers presents the Dutch Golden Age
as the pioneering example of a visual culture. De jongh's emphasizes the plurality of sym-
bolism in Dutch painting and its moral ambivalence. In both cases, the history of an is
connected haphazardly with an analysis of philosophical and literary texts. Thus in both
cases the problems of relating the history of art to the intellectual history of Dutch litera-
ture and philosophy are apparent.
Questions concerning the position of the history of an in the wider framework of his-
tory as discipline are haunting cultural and intellectual historians, treading in the footsteps
of johan Huizinga.
Huizingas reflections on art and history between 1905 and 1935 wcte initially deeply
inspired by the attempts of Dilrhey and other German philosophers and historians to vin-
dicate history as a distinct discipline between the arts and sciences. 54 Inspired by the studies
of Dilthey, Simmel and later also Rorhacker, Huizinga argued that historical understanding
was essentially different from the causal explanation dominating the natural sciences. In
Huizinga's view the primary aim of the historian is to understand individual acts, thus lay-
ing the foundations for more comprehensive representations of the past. Departing from
the German analysis of empathy, Huizinga emphasized the constitutive role of art for the
discipline of history. Developing a 'small phenomenology'\\ of the historian's practice, he
argued that the interaction between art and historical imagination is constitutive to history
as a discipline." In Huiziogas view, both an and history consist principally of the evoca-
tion of images. Images are incipient in historical research, providing the initial stimulus to
further study.
Huizinga's own masterpiece of cultural and intellectual history, The Wdningofthe Middle
Ages, started quite literally 'in the mirror of Van Eyck', and initially Huizinga wanted to
give his study of the culture of the Burgundian Netherlands this title. Aesthetic intuition
made Huizinga wonder about the lack of harmony in Van Eyck'sworks, the passion for de-
tail and the app<:arance of flawless naturalism. This aesthetic appreciation of Van Eyck
raised fundamental issues concerning the medieval mind and suggested the image of a cul-
rure in decline. Likewise, the appreciation of Vermeer and Rembrandr formed the images
which underlie Huieinge's major study of Dutch culture, Dutch Civilization in the Seven-
236 11lSTORY OF CONC:l'-l'TS
teenth Century. Departing from Van Eyck, Vermcer and Rembrandr, Huizinga embarked
on a journey of historical imagination and scrupulous research of an impressive array of
primary sources. The objective was not to achieve a mimetic representation of the past real-
ity of Burgundian and Dutch culture; Huizinga stated that the task of cultural history was
the creative reconstruction of images opening up horizons of historical understanding. As
Huizinga put it, if history wants to achieve its objective 'of reviving the past...it must con-
sciously transcend the borders of what can be known through concepts'. Whilst the natural
scientist tries to capture the knowledge of narure in 'rigorous concepts', the historian moves
beyond the realm of concepts to 'envisage' and create images of the past."
The preponderance of optical metaphors in Huizinga's reflections and his eye for the
constitutive role of art in history, did not mean that art subsumed history. On the contrary,
Huizinga was acutely aware of the methodological problems involving the use of visual
sources in cultural history." In [he course of the decades, as enthusiastic historians in-
dulged themselves in the use of visual sources, Huiaingas own caution and suspicion grew.
He argued that the study of works of art opened only limited perspectives to the historian
of culture. According to Huizinga, 'the idea which works of art give us of an epoch is far
more serene and happy than that which we gain in reading its chronicles, documents, or
even lirerarure'." In his view the 'vision of an epoch resulting from the contemplation of
works of art is always incomplete, always too favourable, and therefore fallacious'. Thus, as
David Preedberg has noted, historians using Dutch works of art as historical sources 'need
to know more about the kinds of knowledge embodied in Dutch pictures, prints, and book
illustrations'. There is, to quote Freedberg again, a need to identify 'the relationship that
mayor not exist between particular kinds of knowledge on the one hand and individual
representational genres on the other'. Historians are required to study works of art within
the appropriate artistic and also epistemological traditions, with a keen eye for both artistic
and socio-economic pressures and serrings."
In addition, Huizingc's own use of works of art raises the grand question of whether im-
ages can be read as texts or whether imagery requires a new hcrmeneurics, distinct from
textual hermeneutics. As Frank Ankersmit has noted, 'anyone who studies the current lit-
erature on the relation in the hope of finding an intuitive confidence in the differences be-
tween the two confirmed is in for a disappoinrmenr'." From Gombrich's Meditations on tl
Hobby Horse to Goodman's Languages ofArt theorists and historians have moved towards a
semiotic approach of images, thus qualifying, if not breaking down, the differences in the
interpretation of visual and textual sources.v- Huizinga himself seemed to favour a
hermeneuric circular approach in relating visual to textual sourccs.v' Thus The Waning of
the Middle Ages circles around Van Eyck. As Van Eyck's works raise fundamental questions
concerning the medieval mind and culture, Huizinga moves to the analysis of textual
sources and returns to Van Eyck in the culmination of his attempt to understand the cul-
ture of the Burgundian Netherlands. However, Huizinga insisted on the essential differ-
ences between texts and images as historical sources. In spite of the preponderance of Van
Eyck, Vermeer and Rembrandt in his work, Huizinga argued that 'literary products offer
one criterion more than the visual arts: they make it possible for us to appraise the spirit as
well as the form'.M
llFTWEEN CA)I,1BR][)GEAND I-lEIDEl.llERG 237
With some notable exceptions, including studies by Reichardr and Skinner,"
Begriffigeschichte and the history of political language have refrained from studying visual
material systematically. In the face of the visual glory and abundance of the Golden Age,
historians of Dutch concepts must take up the formidable challenge to link the study of
visual and textual material and to follow in the hermeneutic footsteps of ]ohan Huizinga.
Herroes, however, is 'wily and deceptive', in the words of Plaro.s'' The virgin of Holland
waits in the garden.
238 HISTORY OF C.ONU::l'TS
On the Contributors
Terence Ball is Professor of Political Science at the University of Minnesota. He received his
PhD from the University of California at Berkeley in 1973. He has held visiting appoint-
ments at Nuffield College, Oxford 0978-79); V.e. San Diego (984); Christ Church, Ox-
ford (1993); Corpus Christi College, Oxford (1995). He has held fellowships from the
Cenrer for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanfcrd. the National Endowment
for the Humanities, and the Woodrow"WilsonInternational Center for Scholars in Washing-
ton, D.e., among others. His books include, most recently, Transfonning Political Discourse
(Oxford 1988), Political Innovation and Conceptual Change (Cambridge 1989), Political Ide-
ologies and the Democratic IdeaL (New York 1995), and Reappraising Political Theory (Oxford
1995). He is co-editor of the forthcoming Cambridge History ofPolitical Thought: Twentieth
Century and a member of the Editorial Board of The[ournal ofPolitical IdeoLogies.
Hans Erich Bodeker is research fellow at the Max-Planck-Insrirur flir Geschichte In
Gbttingen. He has been visiting professor at George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia
(1987), at UCLA (1992), and at the EHESS, Paris (1997). He has co-edited AufkLarung als
Politisierune - Politisierung derAufkLarung (Hamburg 1987), ALteuropa oderFndie Neuzeit/
ProbLeme und Methoden der Forschung (Stuttgart 1991), Le livre reLigieux et scs pratiques:
etudes sur tbistoirede Livre reLigieux en ALlemagne et en France a L'epoque moderne (Gbttingen
1991), AufkLarunglLumiem und Poliktik. Zur politischen Kultur der deusschm und
franzomchen Aufkliirung (996) and edited Lesekulturen im 18. Jahrhundert (Hamburg
1992) and Histaires du Liore: nouveLles orientations (Paris 1995). He has published exten-
sively on German early modern period.
Pim den Boer is Professor of History of European Culture at the University of Amsterdam.
In 1994-1995 he was (together with Wyger Velema) co-ordinator of the theme-group on
Dutch Conceptual History at the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study (NIAS). His
publications include History as a profession. The study of history in France 1818-1914
(Princeron 1998). He his co-author of The history ofthe ideaofEurope (eds. K. Wilson and
J. van dcr Dussen, London 1993), and co-editor of Lieux de memoire et iaentires nationales.
La France et fes Pays-Bas (Amsterdam 1993).
WilIem Frijhoff obtained his PhD with a study on the social history of the early modern
Dutch university system (La societe neeriandaise et ses graduis: une recherche serielle sur Le
statut des inteLleetuaLes 1575-1814, Amsterdam/Maarssen 1981). Before moving to the Free
University of Amsterdam, in 1997, he has been Professor of Cultural History at the
Erasmus University of Rotterdam. He is also a member of the Royal Netherlands Academy
ON THE COl\TRlBUTORS 239
of Sciences. His publications deal mainly with the history of mentalities and historical an-
thropology. Among his publications art (co-Iedired volumes on Witchcraft in the Nether-
landsfrom thefturteenth to the twentieth century (Rotterdam 1991), Cultuur en maatJl'happij
in Nederland 1500-1850: Een historisch-antropoloyisch perspectief (Meppel-Amterdaml
Heerlen 1992), and Lieux de memoirc et idrntites nationales (Arnsrerdam 1993), and a con-
textual biography of a sevenreenrh-cenrury orphan, centred on religious experience and the
construction of the self, Wfgen van Evert Willemsz. Een Holland, weeskind op zoek naar
zichze/f (1607-1(47) (Nijmegen 1995).
Martin van Gelderen is Professor of Inrellecrual History at the University of Sussex. In the
academic year 1994-1995 he was a fellowat the Netherlands Institute ofAdvanced Studies.
His main publications include The political thought ofthe Dutch Revolt (1555-1590), in the
series Ideas in Context (Cambridge 1992) and The Dutch Revolt, in the series Cambridge
Texts ill the History ofI'oliticai Thought (Cambridge 1993).
lain Hampsher-Monk is Professor of Political Theory at rhe University of Exeter, UK. He
is a founder and editor of the journal History 0/Political Thought and author of A History of
Modern Political Thought - major political thinkers from Hobbes to Marx (Oxford 1992)
which won the UK Political Studies Association McKenzie Book Prize. His main research
publications have been in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century radical political thought,
the methodology of the history of political thought, and in aspects of contemporary politi-
cal theory. He was a NIAS fellow 1994-1995. He is currently working on a study of the po-
litical ideas ofEdmund Burke.
Eddy de jongh is a former Professor of An History at the State Universiry ofUtrechr. As an
outstanding scholar of Dutch art he has made a substantial contribution to the iconological
re-evaluation of seventeenth-century painting over the last thirty years. His books include
Still-life in the age ofRembmndt (Auckland 1982), Portretten van echt en trouw: huwelijk en
gezin in de Nederiandse kunst van de zeventiende rcuiu (Zwolle 1986) and Zinne- en
minnebeelden in de schildereunst van de zeventiende eeuw (Amsterdam 1967). A collection
of his articles appeared under the tide Kwesties van betekenis. Tbema en motief in de
Nederlandse schilderkuns uan de zeventiende eeuw (1995). Together with Ger Luijten he
authored Mirror ofEIJeryday Life: Genre Prints ill the Netherlands 1550-1700, the catalogue
of an exhibition held in the Rijksprentenkabiner of the Rijksmuseum (1997).
Bram Kempers is Professor of Cultural Studies and Sociology at the University of Amster-
dam. He works mainly in the field of art-patronage and society in Renaissance Italy. He is
the author of Paintine. power and patronage: the rise o/the proftsslOnal artist in the Italian
Renaissance(Alien Lane, The Penguin Press 1992), an English translation of his PhD Kunst.
macht en mecrnaat: het beroep van schilder in sociaic verhoudingen, 1250-1600 (Amsterdam
1987, also io German). He is co-editor of In opdracht van de staat: opaellen over mrcenaar en
kunst van de Griekse polis tot de Nederlandse natic (Groningen 1994) and Openbaring en
bedrog. De afbeeiding als bistorischebran 11l de lage iandcn (Amsterdam 1995).
240 HISTORY 01' COt"CEI'TS
Reinharr Koselleck, educated at the University of Heidelberg and being one of the initia-
tors of the German project, can be called the Nesror of the Begriffigeschichte. Koselleck was
Professor of Modern History and Theory of History at the Universities of Heidelberg.
Bochum and Bielefeld. He is the author of many books and articles on the history of con-
ceprs, social history and theory of history, and the editor of many volumes, some of which
have to be mentioned, such as his famous PhD. thesis Kritik und Krise. Eine Studie zur
Pathogenese der burgerlichen Welt (1954), his Habilitaticns-work, PreuJ?en zwischen RefOrm
and Revolution. Allgemeines Landrecht, Verwaltung und soziale Bewegung van 1791 bis 1848
(1965) and Vergangene Zukunft. Zur Semantikgeschichtlicher Zeiten (1979).
Hans-jurgen Lusebrink is Professor of Romance Literature and Cultures and lntercultural
Communication at the University of Saarbriicken. He has held several visiting appoint-
ments, amongst others at rhe Ecole des Haures Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris, the
Universire Laval in Quebec and the Universities of Innsbruck, Rouen and Tours. He is the
author of Literarur und Kriminalitiit im Frankreicb des 18. Jahrhunderts (Munich-Vienna
1983) and Schrift, Buchund Lektice in derfranziiJischsprachlgen Literatur Afrikas(Tiibingen
1990). With Rolf Reichardt he is the editor of the Handbuch dcr polidscb-sozialen
Gnmdbegriffe in Frankreich, 1680-1820Vol. I-XIII (Munich 1990- ). Together they wrote
Die Bastille. Zur Symbolgeschichte von Herrschaft und Freiheit (Prankfurt/M 1990). The
books he has edited include, most recently, African Literature and Literary Theory (Ham-
burg-MUnster 1994) and Nationaiismus im Mittelmeerraum (Passau 1994).
Rolf Reichardt is honorary Professor of Modern History at the University of Gieiien. Since
1991 he has been Director of the 'Section Collecting Works on French Research: Culture,
Society, Regions'. He is the co-editor of the Handbuch politisch-sozialer Grundbegriffi in
Frankreich 1680-1820 (Munich 1985-). Among his publications are Reform und Revolu-
tion bei Condorcet (Bonn 1973), Das Revolutionsspiel von 1791 (1989), Die Bildpublizistik
der Fmnrosischen Revolution (with Klaus Herding, Frankfurt/M 1989), The 'Bastille. A His-
tory of a Symbol of Dispotism and Freedom (with Haos-Iurgen Lusebdnk, Durham N.C.
1997). He is the editor, co-editor and co-author of numerous other publications, including
Sieyes, Polirische Schriften 1788-1790 (Munich 1975-1980), AncienRigime, Aufkliirungund
Revolution (Munich 1979- ), Sozialgeschichte derAufkliirungin Frankreich (Munich 1981),
Die Fmnrosische Revolution alsBruchdes gesellschaftlichen BewufJtseim (Munich 1988), Die
Bastille: Symbol und Mythos in der Revolutionsgraphik (Munich 1989), Franeosische Prase
und Pressekarikaturen 1789-1992 (Mainz 1992); Weltbiirger, Europder. Deutscher, Franlre:
Georg Forster zum 200. 10destag (Maim 1994).
Bernhard F. Scholz is Professor of General and Comparative Literature at Groningen Uni-
versity. He studied English and German literature and Philosophy at the universities of
Preiburg, WUrzburg and Hamburg, and Comparative Literature at Indiana University,
Bloomington. USA. His fields of interest are the history of criticism, lirerary semantics and
word-and-image studies. Articles of related interest: 'Lirerarischer Kanon und lirerarisches
System: Uberlegungen zur Komplememaritar zweier lirerarurwissenschafrlicher Begriffe
ON TIlE COl\TRIBUTORS 241
anhand der Kanonisierung von Andrea Alciatos Emblematum liber (1531)' (1987); 'Das
Emblem als Texrsorte und als Genre: Uberlegungen zur Canungsdefinition des Em-
blem'(1986); 'The Res Picta and the Res Significans of an Emblem, and the Indexer's Eye:
Notes on the Basis of an Index of Emblem Art' (1990); 'Emblematik: Entstehung und
Erscheinungsweisen' (I 992); 'El concepto de cronotopo en Bajtln: notas sobre la conexi6n
kantiana' (1993); 'From Illustrated Epigram to Emblem: The Canonization of a Typo-
graphical Arrangement' (1993); 'The Brevity of Pictures. Notes on a Topic of Sixteenth
and Seventeenth Century Treatises Oil the Impresa and the Emblem' (1994); 'Der Mensch .
eine Proponionsfigur. Leonardo da Vincis Illustration zu Virruvs De Architecrura als
Biidtopos' (1994).
Karin Tilmans is currently Research Fellow of the Huizinga Institute and Lecturer of me-
diaeval and Early-Modern History, University of Amsterdam. She works currently on a
project on conceptual history entitled 'Political discourse in the Habsburg Netherlands; the
changing concepts of republic and citizen'. Her publications include Historiography and Hu-
manism in Holland at the time ofEmsmus (Bibliotheca Humanistica et Reformarorica LI,
Nieuwkoop 1992) and articles on late-medieval and early-modern historiography and po-
litical thought in the Netherlands. In the Dutch project on conceptual history, she was
NJAS-fellow 1994-1995 and published on the development of the concept of fatherland
(1400-1600) and she coordinates a research gtoup on the concept of citizenfship).
Maurizio Viroli did his PhD research ar the European University Institute in Florence. He
was a [ean-Monner Fellow at the same institute in 1978-88. He has been Assistant Profes-
sor ofPolirics ar Princecon University, where he is now Professor of Policies. His major pub-
lications include jean jacques Rousseau and the weii-ordered Society (Cambridge 1988) a re-
vised version of his dissertation From Politics to Reason ofState. The Acquisitionand '[rans-
formation of the Language ofPolitics 1250-1600, Ideas in Context 22 (Cambridge 1992),
For Love of Country (Oxford 1995) and Machialle/li (Oxford 1998). Maurizio Viroli was
co-editor, with Gisela Bock and Quemin Skinner, of Machiavelli and Republicanism, Ideas
in Context 18 (Cambridge 1990).
Frank van Vree is Senior Lecturer Cultural History and Media Studies at the University of
Amsterdam. His publications include a study on the formation of Dutch public opinion in
rhe interwar period, De Nederlandse Pm en Duiuiand (Groningen 1989), a history of the
memory of the Second World War, In de schaduio oan Ausdnoits; Hcrinncringcn. beelden,
geschiedems (Groningen 1995) and a history of de Volkskrant, a leading newspaper in the
Netherlands (De mctamortase van ern dt/gb/ad, Amsterdam 1996). He was co-editor of a
volume 011 communication history since the [are middle ages, Tekens en Teksten (Amster-
dam 1992) and is editor of Fcir & Fictic, a journal on the history of representation.
242 HIS'j'O}{YOF CUNCEPTS
Notes
INIfIOIJUCTlO;V
1. R. Koscllcck, 'Inrroducnoo', Geschithtlithe Grundbegriffi VuL I. er Gm:hichtliche Gnmdbegriffi Vat
VII. Srurtgarr 1992.
2. MeJvin Richter, The HiuOlY ofPoliricat and Social Concepts, Oxford 1995.
3. Wygcr Velema, 'Over de noodzakelijkheid van een Nederlandse Begripsgcschiedcnis', in Bullain.
Gmhiedenis, KUlISr, CU/lllur, JIff (1993) 2740; Pim den Boer, 'Naar een geschicdcnis van begrippen
in he! Ncderlands' in: S. Dik and G. Muller (eds.], Het hrmdis naderdnn de TOk. Zes l/oordT(/cht/?lI over
het eigene an de Nederlandst' cultuur, Asscn/Maasrrichr 1992, 47-60.
4. Andrca A!cialUS, also known as Andrea Alcia, Andreas Alciator Andrca Aldato,
5. Provisional title> of forthcoming publications: N. van Sas (ed.) De olltwikkeling van het begrip
Vader/and in Nrdrrland van de late Middelreuwen tor de twilltigue eellw (The Development of the
Concept of the Fatherland in the Netherlands from the Late Middle Ages to the Twentieth Century).
E. Hairsma Mulier and W. Velema (eds.}, De ontwikkeling Vdn het Neder/andse Vrijheid$bt'grip van de
Lare Middeleellwen rot dt' twinrigue ('fUW (Tne of tne Omen Concept of Freedom from
rhc Lare Middle Ages to the Twentieth Century). P. den Hoer (cd.). Omrrenr hrmfihdd en bl'schaving
AtlflZt'f rot begrip$hirrorigh onderzaci: (On Counliness and Civilization. A First Step toward
mal History Research).
CHA/'TER I
1. A more extensive ver,ion of this article has been published in Theoretische Geschiedmis 23/3 (1')96)
290-310. The and background of the Geschichrlicht' Gmndbt'griffi are extensively dealt witn
by Mdvin Richter, 7fJt' History of Political and Social Concept$. A D'itial/Introductioll, Ncw York
1995.
2. J. Ricrcr (cd.), HistorisdleS Wiirtrrbuch der Philosophie VoL I, Darmsradr 1971, 799-80H.
3. E. Rorhackcr, 'Preface', ArchivfUr Begriffigt'schichre Vu!. J (I955).
4. M. Richter, 'Reconstructing the History of Political Languages: Pocock, Skinner and rhc
Geschichtliche Grundbcgrilfe', History and Theory XXIX (I 990) 44.
5. B. Rurhers, Carl Schmitt im Dritten Heich. Wiwmehtlft als Zeitgeiswt'rsliirkung?, Munich 1989.
G. R Koselleck. &griffigl'Schichtlithe Problt'me, 33.
7. C. Schmitt, 'Der Begriff des Poliuschen' (1932). quoted by H. Quarirs, Posiiionen IInd Begriffi C"ar!
Schmitrs, Berlin 1989, J 7.
8. O. Brunncr, rand und Hemchaji. Vienna 1942, J24.
9, In the inrroducricn to the article on 'Staar' in rhe Gnchi,-ht!i,.he Grundbegriffi:, in Face a very cleat ref-
erence is made to the work of Carl Schmitt. W. Conze in his introduction in Geschichdiche
Grundbegrifft VoL VI, 5.
10. 'Bund', 'Oemokratie', 'EmanLiparion', 'Forrschrirr', 'Ceschichre', 'Herrschafc', 'Krise',
'Rcvolurion' and parts ofSraar/Souveranirac', 'Verwalrung' and 'Vclk/Nation'.
I I. Gm-hichtlicbe Grundbegri./fi:Ill, G17,
NOTl'S 243
12. GeschichslicheGnmdbegriffi l!l, 649-650.
13. W. Schulae, 'Dcutschc GeschichrswisscllSchafr nach 1945', Supplement 10 (1989), Historische
Zeilschrift, Munich 1993,261.
14. Come edited voJumcsll (1975), IV (1978) and V (1984) and completely or partially wrote the en-
tries on 'Add', 'Arbeit', 'Atbeitet', 'Ballo', 'Eeruf', 'Dcmokrane', 'Panarismus', 'Prciheu',
'Militarismos', 'Mittdstand', 'P",I",tatiat', 'Ras.\e', 'R<:ich', 'SakuI3tisation', 'Sichcrhcn'
and 'Schurz'. His entries on 'Sraar/Souveranitat' and 'Stmd/Klasse' were published posthumously
15. R Koscllcck, 'Werner Conze, Tradition und lnnovarion'. HisrorischeZeilschrift 245 (1987) 529543.
1G. For a detailed description of the atmosphere at Konigsberg and Rothfels position, sec the semi-auto-
biographical passages in W. Conze. 'Ham Rothfels', Historische Zeilschrift 237 (1983) 311}60.
17. Die deur<che Koionie Hirschenhof DI/5 Wrrden einer dcutschen Sprachimel ill Liuland {I 934), see W.
Weber, BiographiiCht', Lt'xikIJ" zur Gt'fchichrswissemchaft in Dentschland, Dsurreich u"d der Schweiz,
Frankfurt on Main 1987, 92.
18. According to Kosclleck, [here were definitely two Of thrt'c ,ent",nc",s with an ami-S"'mitic drift in an
article Conze wrote in 1938. Kosellcck, 'Wnner Conzc', Historische Zeit$chrift (1987) 53G.
19. Ibidem 537.
20. In an otherwise favourable review of La Midirerranit' in Histonsche Zeir<chrUi 172 (1951) 358-362,
Conze completely misjudged the meaning of Braudcls work. He W3S of the opinion rhar lhere was a
resemblance between Braudel's ideas and Ono Brunner's conceptions of social history defendcd in
the Aneeiger der phil.-hiS{. Klmse 1948, 335 If.
21. After completing his studies, Brunncr initially worked in the atchive,. In 1929, his professorial dis-
sertation was about the financial situation in Vienna in the Middle Ages. Literature about Brurmcr
includes Weber, Biographisches Lexicon, 72; L Buisson, Zum (,'edenkm an Ono Srunner 1898-1982,
Hamburg 1983, 13-31; j. Van Horn Meiron, 'Ono Brunner and the Idcological Origins of Be-
griffsg"'schichte' in The Meaning of Historical Terms and Concepts, 21-33; O. Brunner, 'Alphonse
Dopsch'. Zeitschrift der SaVlgny-Stiftungfur 72 (1952) 455-458.
22. W. Come in his Introduction on 'Staat', (,'($chichtfiche Cnmdbegnjfe, VI 5.
23. R. Koselleck, 'Begriffsgeschichdi(he Problem", dcr Verfassungsgeschiclltsschreibung', Gegemtand und
Begriffi dcr Vajassung$gm-hithtc, Berlin ] ')83; 'Der Sraar', Zeiuchrift fur Staa(s!ehrt', OjFnrlichn Recht
und Ver!ammgsgesthithte, Supplement VI, 1216.
24. O. Brunner, Land und Ht'mchaft, Vienna 1')42,501.
25. He was successor to the influmtial Hermann Aubin, who also published the famous
Vierteij'ahressclmftjur Wirtschafts- und Sozialgl'schichrefrom 1925 to 1967.
26. R. Koselleck, 'Begriffsge,chichdiche Problerne', 16, see also W. Schulze, Dt'uuche
Cm'hichrswi"ellSchafi nach 1945, 2f11301 'Von der "polirischen Volksgeschichrc'' zur "neuen
Sozialgeschichre'" .
27. O. Brunner, Adehges I.andll'bol und EuropiiischerGrist. reprinr Salzburg 1954, 12.
28. See for examplc Altcuropa und die moderue Cese/t,(haft. Feswlmfi fiir Ouo Bnmner, Historical Semi-
nar of the University of Hamburg, Gottingen 1963.
29. The ,ame p3ssagt' from Land und Herrschafr quoted by R. Koselleck, 'Bcgriffsgcschichrliche
Probltl'tlt der IG, and by W. Conze, Geschlchte Grundhegriffi, VIS.
30. In essence, this was a reprint of an earlier article, 'Feudillismus'. Ein Bdrrag zur Begrijjsgeschichre,
Akaderuic der Wissenschahen und der Litnatuur in Mainz, 1958, 591-627.
31. R. Rcichardr, Introduction, Handburh, vol. 11I1, Munich 1985, 63-64.
32. 'Ein Grundbcgrirr ligt also gerade dann VOf, wenn er pcrspektivi5ch verschieden ausgelegt werdcn
muss, um Ein,icht zu finden oder Handlungsfahigkeir ZlI sriften', Gachichtliche CrundbegriffiVIl,
VI!. Cr. Koscllcck, Foreword, Gmhichrliche Cru'ldbegriffiVIl, VI.
33. R. Rcichardr, Introduction, Handbuch, 78-82.
34. H.U. Cumbrechr and R. Reirhardt, 'I'hilosophc, Philosophic', Hilndbuch III (1985) 3.
35. Somc "f the terms Kosdleck specifics are Kitche, 'Sekte', 'Kunst', 'Wi5sen5chaft' and 'Technik . The
groUP5 include 'Barbarcn', 'Wilde', 'Hcidcn', 'Knechr', 'Diener' and 'SkIave'
244 HISTORY OF CO:-JCEPTS
36. GmhidHliche Grulldbegrifje VII, p- VII. Other older terms rhat Koselleck specified include
'Heiligkeir. "Trauer", 'Marryrcr', 'Gedachtnis', 'Nachwclt', '[)icsdts', 'Raum', and 'ZcirlZciraltcr'.
Some of rhe terms from the field of ecology arc 'Land', 'Landschafr', 'Erde', 'Feuer', 'Luft'. 'Wasser'
and'Meer'.
37. L van den Branden, Het urroen naar verheerlijking, zuivering en opbouwuanhet Nederlands in de 1Gde
eeuw (The Pursuit of the Glorificarion, Purification and Advancement of the DutCh Language in the
Sixteenth Century]. Ghem 1956.
31L Srcvin hoped that the introduction of Dutch in science would make it more accessible for borh adults
and children. For a reprint of the original edition, see The Principal Work" ofSimon SUVill, voL v,
Am.\terdam 1966,465-581.
39. S. Stcvin, Het burgerb]'k ieoen (Bourgeois Life), printed by Nicobes van Ravensreijn. Amsterdam
1646. For an impressive list of neologisms attributed ro Srevin and compared, see K.W. de Groot,
'Het purisme van Simon Srevin' (The Purism of Simon Stevin), in De Nieuwe Tat/fgidf 13 (1919)
161-]82.
40. Jmportant work in this field has been done by Martin van Ccldcren, Thepoiirical thought ofthe Dutrh
Revolt(15551590), Cambridge 1992, and The Dutch Revolt, Cambridge 1993.
41. The results produced by these work groups are eo be published in rhe near future. N. van Sas (ed.) De
o/ltwikkeLinK Mn IJet begrip Vaderfand in Ncderland van de lareMiddeluuwen tot de twilltigste eenu.
(The Development of rhe Concept of the Fatherland in the Netherlands from the Late Middle Age,
to the Twentieth Century). E. Haitsma Mulier and W. Velcma (cds.], De ontwikkding van het
Nedcrlandse Vrijheid,begrip van de Late Midddeanoen tot de twintigJ'uuuw (The Development of the
Dutch Concept of Freedom from the Late Middle Ages to the Twentieth Century). 1'. den Boer (cd.l-
Omtrellt hoofiheiden be.<chaving. Amlzer tot onderzoee(On Courrlincss and Civili7a-
rion. A First Step toward Conceptual History Research).
42.]. Huizinga, 'Nedcrland's gccsrcsmcrk' (The Mark of the Dutch Mind), Verzamefde lX'erken (Col-
lected Works), Haarlem 194R1953, VII 291.
CHAI'TF.1I2
1. Originally published under rhe title 'Sozialgeschichte und Begriffsgeschichte' in W. Schieder and V.
Sellin, Sozia!ge,chichu in Deuf>'chland, Vo!. I, Comngen 1986, 89109. Aparr from rhe books and ar-
rides menrioned in the notes and in other contributions ro this volume, the following rides may be
recommended: Eugenic Coseriu, Synchronie, Diachonie und Geschichu, Munich 1974; Hans-Georg
Gadamer, Die Begri}figeschichu und die Spmche der Philosophie, Opladen 1971; Reinharr Kosellcck
(cd.), Historighe Semantik und BegriJfigeschichfl', Smllgan 1978; Rcginc Robin, Histoirf et
lingui,tique, Paris 1973; lrmlinc VeirBtmse, 'A Note Oil Begtiffsgeschichre', Historyand Theory 20
(1981) 61-67.
2. H. G. Meier, Article 'Begriffsgeschichtc', in Historiuhes Wi)rurh/lfh der Phil{JJophie Vo!. L Basell
Stuttgart 1971, cob. 788-808.
3. R. Eucken, GeschichtederphiloJl)phf$then hrm;nologit, Leipzig 1879 ]9(4).
4. O. Bnmner, I.and u"d Hemchaft, 2nd ed., Brno/Munich/Vienna 1942, xi.; Land and Lordship:
St.-uctures ofGovernance ;n Medieval Austria, trans. Howard Kaminsky and jamcs Van Horn Mclron,
Philadelphia, 1992.
5. See W. Conzc, 'Zur Grundung des Arbeirskreises fur moderne Sozialgeschkbre', HamburgerJahrbuch
flir Wimchafts- und Ge,d!.schaft,politik 24 (1979) 23-32. Conze himself preferred the term 'structural
history', in order to avoid the restriction to 'social questions' that the word 'social' often brought with
it. Ono Brunner rook up the term 'srrucrural history' in order to avoid the restriction - dictated by
the times in which he was writing - to a 'history of the German people' [Volhgeschichrel, which, fol-
lowing his theoretical premises, was, even in 1939, directed towards structures. On this, compare the
second edirion of Land und Hemchaft (l942), 194, with the fourth revised edition (Vienna/
NOTES 245
Wiesbaden 1959) 164. This is a good example of how even politically dictated cognitive interests can
produce new theoretical and methodological insighrs which outlast the situation in which they arose.
6. See Hayden White, Tropio ofDiscourse, Baltimore and London, 1982'.
7. On this sec the D. Schwab's article 'Farnilie' in Geschichrliche Grundbegriffi Vel. 2, Stuttgart J975,
271-301; E. Kapl.Blume, Liebeim Lexieon. MA thesis, Bielefeld 1986.
CHAPTFR 3
1. Whilst writing this essay, I have bcnefined greatly from discussions with Martin van Gelderen, Hanoi
Bodeker, Dario Castiglione and my two co-editors, and from the comments of audiences at the
Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study, Wassenaar and at the Universities of Amsterdam and
Leiden.
2. The major substantive works are Qucnrin Skinner, Foundations ofModern Political Thoughr, 2 vols.,
Cambridge 1978; and J .G.A. Pocock, The Machiavellian Moment. FlorcntinePolitical Thought and the
Atlantic Republican Tradition, Princeron 1975. Methodological works are cited in the body of this
chapter as appropriate. Major representative methodological statements of each author are; Quentin
Skinner 'Meaning and Undemanding in the Hisrory of Ideas' reprinted in James Tully [ed.), Meaning
and Context: Quenriu Skinner and his Crina, Cambridge 1988; and J .G.A.Pocock, The Slate of the
An' in Pocock, Virtue Commerce and History (itself one of the 'Ideas in Conrcxt' series), Cambridge
1985. Assessments and bibliographies can be found for Skinner in J.luUy, Meaning and Context,
Cambridge 1988, and for Pocock in J.W.HampsherMonk, 'Political Languages in Time: The work
ofJ.G.A.Pocock' in The BritishJournd! ofPoliticalSciem-e XIV no. I (1984) 89-1 16_
3. Quotations arc drawn from the seriesdescription found in all volumes, facing the title page, e.g. Peter
N. Miller, Defining the Common Good, Empire, religion and philo$ophy in eighteenth century Britain,
Cambridge 1994, ii_
4. The origins of the Centre are described in 'The History of British Political Thought: the Creation of
a Centre', j.GAPocock, Journal ofBritish Studies, 24 3(1985) 283-310; Proceeding$ ofthe (:enterjor
the Study ofthe Hi$to'J' of British PoLitical Thought, Gen. cd. Cordon Schochet, 5 vols., Washingwn
D.e. 19901993; and ).G.A.l'ocock with Cordon J.Schocher and Lois G.Schwoerer (ed.), Varieties
of British Polincal Thought 1500-1800, Cambridg<: 1991 Other more specialist works relare inti-
mately 10 particular portions of that seminar. Amongst those which are closest to the interests of con-
ceptual history are Terence Ball and j.G.A. Pocock (eds.}, Conceptual Changeand the Constitution,
Lawrence Kansas 1988, Linda Levy Peck, The Mental World oftheJacobean Court, Cambridge 199\,
RA Mason (cd.), Scots and Britons:Scottish Political Thought and the Union of1603, Cambridge, and
j.C. Robertson (cd.) A Unionfor Empire: the Union of1707 in the Context ofBritish Politira1 Thought,
Cambridge.
5. Few such. comparisons have come to my notice. Thc major exception and pcrsistent anglophone
champion of Begriffigesehicl;re, in a number of articles published between \986 and the present, has
been Mdvin Richter. His 'Pocock, Skinner and the Ge;chichtfiche Grundbegrdft' appeared in History
1I1ld Themy 19(1990) 3870 and is now superseded by his critical inrroducucn The History ofP()/itil'al
and SocialConcepts, Oxford 1995, which appearcd after the writing of the conference papet on which
this chapter was based. Chapter 6 contains an extended comparison of Begriffigeschichte, Pocock and
Skinner, however even Richter's comparison focuses on their methodological prescriptions rather
their intellectual entrepreneurship. Sec also 'Editorial' by Michael Freeden, Journal ofPolitical ideolo-
gie;2/1 (1997) 3-11.
6. For example the contributions to the volume by l'im den Boer and Hans Bodeker.
7. j.G.A. Pocock 'The History of Political Thought: a methodological enquiry' in Politics, Phi/o;ophy
and Society, ser. 2, Oxford 1962, and Quenun Skinner's 'Meaning and Understanding in the History
of Ideas', History and Theory8 {1969}, reprinted in jamcs 'fully (ed.) Mei1ning and Context: Quentin
Shinner and hi$Cmia, Cambridge 1988_
246 IllSTORY OF COt\O:l'TS
8. When 1 was an undergraduate my nororiousiy conrrovnsial Professor of Philosophy Anrhony flew,
began his first year lectures with the following announccmcnr: Today 1 begin our Introduction to
Philosophy course. ! shall be lenuring on Phro for rhe first rerm, and 1 don't want to hear anyone
complaining that we aren't doing conremporary philosophy because we are!'.
9. Thu5 Pocock remarked in 1969: 'rhc hisrory of political rhoughr has a constant tendency to become
philosophy.' Curiously, Pocock sees rhis as driven not only by misplaced philosophical standards, but
also by historical demands of narrative coherence. Pocock, 'History of polirical thought', Politics, Phi-
losophy and Society, 187. er the not enrirely dissimilar position of Koselleck in 'Terror and Dream:
Methodological Remarks on rhe Experience of Time during the Third Reich' in Reinharr Koselleck
(n. Keith Tribe), Futures Past: on the semantics o/historiml time, Carnbrige Mass. 1985, 215; original
Zukunji_ Zur gm:hit-htlicha Zeiten, Frankfurt am Main 1979. A provoking and
sensitive discussion on the relationship between this kind of political theory and various srmnds
within the 'historical revolution' is provided by Dario Casriglione 'Historical Argumems in Political
Theory' Politiml Theory Naoslater 5 (1993) 89-109.
10. This is not to say that these claims were not often advanced with considerable erudition and scholar-
ship. On Marsilius and Hobbes as liberals see A.Gewirth Marsilius ofPadua - the Deftnder of the
Peace, 2 vols. London and New York 1961, and Leo Strauss The Polirical Philosophy ofHobbe" its basis
andgmesir, Oxford 1936, Plato's totalitarianism is famously unmasked in Karl Popper: The OpenSo-
ciery and its Enemies, 2 vols., volume I: The Speff of Plato, London 1945; and the locus classicus for
Rousscau surprisingly short chapter by J.L.Talmon in his Origim of Totalitarian Democracy,
London \952. See my 'Rousscau and Toralirariamsm - with hindsight?' in Robert Woklcr (ed.],
Roum'lll< and I.iberry, Manchester 1995, 267-88.
11. Amongst the work> cited by Skinner as engaging in this and related practices which involve 'reifying'
doctrines, many but by no means all, emerging from Political Science Departmenrs, are the follow-
ing: Emst Cassirer, The Philorophy ofthe Enlightenment, Boston 1955; G.E.G.Cadin, A History ofPo-
lirical Philosophy, London 1950; ].W. Gough, John Lode's Political Philolosophy, Oxford 1')50;
Andrew Hacker, Political Theory: Philo$(Jphy Ideology, Seienu, New York 196 1; Peter H. Merkl, Politi-
cal Continuity and New York 1967; Christopher Morris, Political Thought in Englandfrom
Tyndale to Hooker, Oxford 1953; Hans J. Morgenrhau, Dilemmas ofPolitics. Chicago 1958; John
Plamenatz, Man and Society 2 vols, London 1963; Bertrand Russell History ofWmern Philosophy,
New York 1946; G.H. Sabine, A History o/Political Theory, London 1951; Leo Srrauss, History of1'0-
tineal Philosophy, Chicago 1963; TO. Weldon, and Morals, London 1946.
12. This paragraph summarizes the scucrure of Skinner's argument in sections I and 11 of 'Meaning and
Understanding', Meaningand Context, 30-50. A number of these points - particularly [he tendency
to reorganize though, to a higher level are also to be found in Pocock's 1969 article.
13. The mOSt salurary example of [his was the virtual ignoring of the English Civil War thinker james
Harringron, whose work was neither philosophical, in {he sense of engaging in or epis-
temological preliminaries, nor it must be said a model of clarity. A5 Pocock has shown, however, he is
the pivoral figure borh for the transmission of civic republican thought and for English
historiographical self-understanding in the later sevenreenrh and eighteenth centuries. See the semi-
nal 'Machiavclli, Harrington and English Political Ideologies in rhe Eighteenth Century', William &
Mary QI<t1rterfy jrd ser. vo!. XXllJ4 (\965) reprinted in Pocock Politics and Time, Chicago
and London, Chicago 1971, as well as Chapters II and 12 in The Machiarellian Moment. Pocock's
edirion of The Political Workr offames Harrington, Cambridge 1977, contains a 150 page introduc-
tion which includes a substantial chapter on 'Harringron's ideas after his lifetime'.
14. The classic case here was (he assumption that Lockc, ,imply because he came after Hobbes, was in
sense 'responding' to him. That Locke was virtually oblivious of Hobbes, and the vital irnpor-
ranee of recognising Filmer a, rhe adversary in order to understand Locke's argument was demon-
strated by Peter Laslett in his crucial edition of Locke's 7ivo Treatises of G"oranment, Cambridge,
Cambridge University Press, 1960 - a work which exerted a seminal influence on Skinner's early un-
derstanding of context, Skinner, 'Reply ro my Critics', MMning and Context, 327 fn.l2.
)-.lOTES 247
15. Although thi, t"ay focusses on only rhc first tWO, John Dunn's early methodological essay 'The Iden-
tity of the HistOry of Ideas' in Philosophy, XLII! (April 1968), reprinted Politics, Philosophy and Soci-
ny TV, ed. by P. Lasletl, W.G. Runciman and Qucnnn Skinner, Oxford 1972, and in John Dunn, Po-
Titieal ObligtltiorJ in its Historical Context, Cambridge 1980, was one of the trio of works invariably
cited as initiaring [he historical revolution. The other two were Pocock's 'History of Polirical Thought
a Methodological Enquiry' in Politics Philosophy and Society 1I, Oxford 1962, and Skinner's own
'Meaning and Undemanding in the History of Ideas', first published in History tllld Theory 8 (1%9)
and reprinted in J. Tully (ed.], Meaning and Context, Cambridge 1988. Skinner generously credits
Dunn with the insight that Austin" thcory of ,petch-an, might be relevant eo the inrerprttarion of
texts in the history of political thought. 'A Reply to my Critics', Meaning and Context, 327 fn 12.
16, ' ...A methodological enquiry', 187.
17. Thus Locke turns out not to be related to Hobbes at JIL but, antithetically to Filmer (as shown by
Lasletr}, and by way of his consrrual of the language of sovereignty to George Lawson (lulian
Franklin), possibly the Levellers and ultimately Calvinist resistance rheorisrs (Quentin Skinner).
18. 'When wc speak of 'language", ther",fore. wc mean for the most part sub-languages: idiom"
rherorics, wap of talking about politics, distinguishable gJme5 of which each may have irs own vo-
cabulary, rules, preconditions and implications, tone and style.' The Concept of a Language and the
Metier d'Historien: some considerations on practice' in Amhony Pagden (ed.), The Lllnguagel ofPoliti-
cal The-ory in Earfy-Modan Europe. Cambridge 1987.
19. This was particularly true in Pocock's first work, The Ancient Constitution and the Feudal Law, Cam-
bridge 1957, reissued 1987, where Common Lawyers, Royalists and Antiquarians formcd different
and eventually ideologically wnf1iClillg conceptions of thc pa>\.
20. Pocock: The Owl Reviews his Feathers: a valedictory lecture', xerox, John> Hopkins University, May
11rh 1994: the history of political thought 'has been becoming all my life less a history of thought
than of language, discourse, literature' (18).
21. See most enthusiastically, Politics Langw1l/ tIIJd Timl', preface to reprint. Chicago and London 1989,
x, and the first and last essays therein 'Languages and [heir Implications' and 'On the
Non-revolutionary CharaCler of Parndigms'. but note in Thc Concept of a Language'{21}: 'we may
think of them as having the characrer of paradigms, in that they operate so a, to structure though!
and speech in certain ways and to preclude their being structured in others, we may not describe
them as paradigms if the term implies that preclusion ha, been succes,fully effected'.
22. 'Languages and their Implications', 25; "lhc Concept of a Language', 23; 'The state of the an', 7.
23. 'Burke and the Ancient Constirmion', in Historiml JIJumaT1II/2 (I9(0) and in Politics Languagl;' and
Time.
24. This is not quite the idiom in which Pocock puts the point sec 'The Concept of a Language', 26-7,
but it seems concisely appropriate.
25. 'Stare of the an', VirtuI;' COmmtrutlml Hi,tory, 10.
26. The concept of a language', 26-27; and lesslilrmally 'State of the art', 10.
27. There weresuch rhinkers as Sheldon Wolin's 'Epi<:Theorists': the 'fully self-conscious linguistic per-
former', Hobbcs was one such, but their identification was a matter of empirical historical
!'ocock, Virtue Commerce and History; 'Inrroducrion- the state of the art', 16-17.
28. See Hobbes, Leuiashan, ed. R. Tuck, Cambridge 1991, 395-396 (protection and obedience); ChaptCf
42 pamm, esp. 271 ('profession with the rongllc is but an exrernall thing'; 285 ('internaIl faith is in its
own nature invisible, and consequently exempted from all humane jurisdiction') page numbers cited
from original.
29. 'State of th", an', 21; the reference is to Stanley Fish, Is There a Jext in This Cltm? The Authority ofIn-
terpretil'e Communities, Cambridge, Mass. 1980.
30. 'Languages and rhcir Implications', Pofitin, Language and Time. 6.
3 I. A. Lockyer, 'Pocock's Harringron', Political Studie" XXVIIJ/3 (J980).
32. See 'Language' and their Implications' Potitin, Language and Time, 2.'1-4. 'It is true that [a user oflan-
gunge] could not have meant ro convey any message which the resources of language in his lifetime
248 I {[S]()){Y Of CONG,)'TS
did not render ir possible for him 10 have mcant; ... hut within these limits there is room for it to have
happened 10 him (as it happens to all of us) t(l mean more than he said or to say more than he meant'
Also 'Stare of the art', 20-1. Pocock's emphasis seems to have shifted here. The early works, and the
flirtation with the 'paradigm', suggest logic or grammar as the primary quality of the 'language', the
later offer, a le.', formalistic characterisation as 'idiom' or rhetoric. 'It is a history of rhetoric rarhcr
than grammar, of the affective and effective content of speech rather than its structure.' The concept
of a language', 22
33. For example: 'The Concept of a Language and the Mttier d'hi,torim' where he proposes 'm let them
[meta{heory, a general theoty of language] atise, if they r i ~ at all, out of the implications of what I
shall be saying we as historians do. The Mhier d'historim ... is primarily his craft or practice' (I9).
34. J.L. Austin, How to do things with Word!-, edited by J.O. Urmson, Oxford Oxford University Press
1962 [delivered as the WiIliam Jame, Lectures, Harvard, 1955]; John R. Searle, Speech Acts, an WIl)'
in the Philwoph), ofLanguage, Cambridge 1969.
35. British Rail once rook to issuing 'pro-warnings'. Thus if {he Buffet on the train was going to close
down - characteristically just before supper time on long journeys - the pas,engers would he warned,
but before being warned, there would be a pre-warning - that there was going to be a warning. But a
prc-warning, a, I pointcd our in what I believe to be the only letter the Guardian has ever published
on the subject of speech acts, is a logical impossibiliry By uttering the word 'warning' you do in fact
and irresistibly warn and no pre-waming can soften the blow.
36. Austin, How to do things wirh Words, 98 ff. For the formal elabcrarion of the rules see John Searle.
SpeechAm, Cambridge I %9, Chapter 3, 'The Structure of Illocutionary Acts'.
37. William Shakespeare, Hem)' IVpLI, Act Ill, I, 11.53-5.
38. Here Skinner drew on another topic from contemporary philosophy of action, the relationship be-
tween action, intention and convention. G.E.M. Ansc(lmbe, Intelltion, Oxford J957; A.I. 1\1ddon,
FreeAaion, New York, Humanities: Peter Ceach, Mental Am, London.
39. See the classic article by John Searle 'How to derive ought" from "is''', The Phif"'ophcaf Rwiew, janu-
ary 1964.
40. 'Meaning and Understanding', in Tully (ed.}, Meaning and Context, 55.
41. As may have happened during rhe arrainder of Strafford in 1641 when Edmund Wailer asked in the
English Parliament - as if for a specific list of statutes - whar {he fundamental laws of the Kingdom
were, and was told by speaker Mayilard, that if he didn't kilOw he had no business silting in (he
House!
42. 'Meaning and Undemanding', in Tully (ed.), Meal/ingand Context, 63-64.
43. The rheory of speech acts may be approached most easily in ].L. Austin's How to do thing, with words,
A more developed account is John R.S",arle's SpeechAm: all eSSlI)' in rhephilosophy oflangllage, Cam-
bridge 19(,9; Skinner's major statement was 'Meaning and Understanding in the History of Ideas',
Historj and Theory!l (1969), reprinted with other essays hy him, criticisms of his position and his
'Reply to My Critics'.
44. Especially; 'Meaning and Understanding', in Tully (ed.), Meaning and Context, 48, SS, 64; 'Motives,
intentions and lntcrprerarion', in Ibidem 76-7. On The Prinuas subversive see Skinner, Faundarions
oIModnn Political 1"hfJUght, vol.I, 128 ff., and less extensively in 'Introduction' to The Prince. ed.
Quentin Skinner and Russell Price, Cambridge 19!18.
45. For example in 'Some Problems in rhe Analysis of Political Thought and Action', 114 fr. Pocock
broadly endorses this account, 'The Concept nf a Language', 34.
46. Thar illocurionary verbs are vulnerable to this kind of subversion follows logically from the fact that
they are definable in terms (If rules, the criterion for rhe application of which cannot be exhaustively
specifIed. This is hinrcd at by Searlc, SpeechAm, 71.
47. For examples of Pocock's approach and anglophone conceptual history applied here sec
J.G.A.Pocock, 'The Americanization of Virtue', eh. 5 of Machiavellian Moment, Ball and Pocock
(eds.}, Conceptual Change and the Constitution.
rcot'rs 249
48. Paul Adams, 'Republicanism in Political Rhetoric before 1776', in Political Science QuarterlyLXXXV
(1970).
49. For a fuller account see T. Ball 'A Republic - ifyou can keep it' in: Ball and Pocock (eds.}, Conceptual
Change; and Hampsher-Monk. 'Publius, The federali,t", in A HistoryofModern Political Thought, Ox-
ford 1992, 227-231.
50. Dario Castiglione, Political Theory NewsLetter, 5/2 (1993) 89" I 09, esp, 92"4. Pccock considers the
inrerplay berween language and speech act in 'The Stare of the An' in Virtue Commerce aud Hi,tory,
esp. 4-7 and fE; Skinner indicates the inadequacy of 'language' itself as the unir of analysis in 'Some
Problcms in the Analysis of Political Thoughr and Action' in Tully (ed.}, Meaui/lgalld Coutext, 106.
51. Skinner advances rhe view rhar 'One way of describing my original [methodological] essays would be
to say that I merely tried to identify and restate in more abstract terms rhe assumptions on which
Pocock's and especially Lasletts scholarship seemed lO me lO be based.' 'Reply 10 my Critics' in 'Iully,
Menujugand Coutext, 233.
52. 'Concepts and Discourses: a Difference in Culture?' conference Pepct- in The Meaning of Historicai
Terms and Concepts" newHudjel on Begnffigeschlchteed. Hanmur Lehmann and Mdvin Richter, Cer-
man HislOrical Inscirutc Occasional Papcts no. IS (German Historical Institute, Washington DC.
19(2),48.
53. 'Problems in the Analysis of Political Thought and Action', MeaninKand Context, ! OG
54. 'The Concept of a Language' in 1'3gden (cd.] Language, ofPolitical Theory, 29ff.
55. Skinner, FOImdatiom ofModern Political Thlmg"t! xi.
56. l'ocock responds to McJvin Richter's characterisation of Begriffigeschichre in rhe German Historical
lnsrirute of WashingIOn's Occasional Paper, 15 'The Meaning of Historical Terms and conceprs, new
studies on Begriffigeschicht/, ed. Hartmur Lehmann and McJvin Richter, Washington DC, German
Historical lnsnrurc, 199G.
57. Skinner, for eX3mple in an extended discussion of Raymond WiJIiams's Keywords which mighr be de-
scnbed 3S ess3ys in conceptual or at lensr lexical history, 'Language and Social Change', in Meaning
and Context. The concerns of Pocock's 'Modes of Political and Historical Time' in Virtue Commerce
and Hist01Y, bear a striking resemblance to those of Koselleck's essays (especially 'Modernity and the
Planes of Historicity' and 'History, Histories and Formal Structures ofTime') in Futures Past.
58. 'Reply tu my nitics', 283.
59. His Th,.Hhtory ofPolitical and SocialConccpn, a critical iutroduction, Oxford 1995, includes material
from a number of previously published essays. Onc should also mention Keith Tribe's path-breaking
and prescient effort in translating Futures Pasr as long ago as 1979, Cambridge, Mass.
60. In a criti<:al rC.'ponse to one of Richter's earlier articles, jcrcmy Rayner claims that Richter is wrong to
present ir as an end in itself, and so a direcr alternative to the 'Cambridge School', when Koselleck et.
al. themselves present it as an aid to the undersranding of history more broadly understood. Rayner,
'On Begriffigeschichre', PoliticalTheory 16/3 (1988).
GI. Translator's introduction, to Kosellcck Futures Past, xiii.
G2. Koselleck, .Begriffigeschiche and Social History', Futures Past, 80.
G3. Ibidem79.
64. Ibidemso.
65. 'Begriffigeschiche & Social History', Futures PllSt, 85, 88.
G6. "Neuzen'", Futures Past, 231
67. Whilst I'ocock tends to the fotmer ('it is not my business lO say that language is the only ultimate re-
ality' - 'Concepts and Discourses' 9); Skinner tends to the latter (See his approving summative quo-
tation of Charles Taylor's stress on the 'artificiality of the distinction between social re3lity and the
language of description of that social reality.' 'Language and Social Change' in Tully (ed.), Meaning
and Context. 132. However, see also Pocock, 'Political Ideas as historical events: Political Philosophers
as Historical Actors'. in M. Richter (cd.), Po/itildl Theory and PoliticalEducatiou, I'rinccton 1980.
68. 'lames Parr. 'Understanding Conceptual Change Politically', inTercncc BaiL jamcs Far! and Russell
Hanson (eds.). PoliticalInnovation and Crmaptual Change, Cambridge 1989, 31.
250 HISTORY OF CONCEI''I'S
69. For example, on the linguistic problem of founding as a speech net see Bonnie Honig, 'Declarations
of Independence: Arendt and Dcrrida on the problem of founding a republic.' American Political
Science &view 85/1 (1991).
70. Keirh Baker, Inventing the French Revolution, Cambridge, 1990,9.
71. Ibidem 204.
72. lain Hampsher-Monk, 'On not performing the British Revolution', paper presented ro the Anglo
American Conference, HisroricalInstirure, London 1990,
73. 'Begriffigm'hicheand Social History', Ibidem 82.
74. Ibidem 81, 82.
75. Ibidem 80.
76. [ames Farr, 'Understanding Conceptual Change Politically', in Terence Ball, [ames Fan and Russell
L.Hanson (eds.}, Political Innovation and Conceptual Change, Cambridge 1989.
77. The essays in Poiitical lnnouation and Conceptual Change come as close to comradicting this assertion
as any, but notice how the most successful of them - that by Quenrin Skinner on the State, is actually
an exploration of the different ways in which the word state and its cognates changed its meaning
within a number of different renaissance and early modern polincal languages, it is rhus more the
Story of range of languages than the story of a single concept. The least successful, in my view - that
of Hanson on Democracy- is so because if fails to locate the discussion of the word within any identi"
Fiable discrete language(s).
78. Futures I'a>f, 'Begnffigeschiche and Social History, 90, 86, 79; 'Representation Event Structure', pm-
tim esp. 1I 5.
79. Cf Richter, History ofPolitical and Social Concept>, 10.
80. 'Meaning and Undemanding', Meaning and Conrext, 55-6.
CHAPTER 4
I. Cf. Reinharr Koselleck, 'Begriffsgeschichtlicbe Probleme dcr Verfassungsgeschichtsschreibung', in
Gegemtalld und Begriffi der VerfimungsgeJChichtsJChreibulIg, supplement to Der Staat VI, Berlin 1983,
15.
2. R. Knsclleck, 'EinleilUng' [Introduction] in: Ono Brunner, Werner Come, Reinhatt Koselleck (eds.},
Geschichtfiche Grundbegriffi. HiJforisches Lrxikon zur politisch.sozialen Sprache in Deutschland; Vo!. I,
Stuttgart 1972, xiii-xxviii.
3. Ibidem xiiif
4. Ibidem passim.
5. cr Reinhart Koselleck, 'Begtiffsgeschichte und Sozialgeschicbtc', in Peter"Christian Ludz (ed.l,
Soziologic und SoziaIgeschichte, A,pekte und Probleme, Opladen 1972, 117; cf. also the contribution of
Koselleck to this volume; see also Helmut Herding, Begriffigrschichteund Sozialgeghichte, in HZ 223
(1976)98-110.
6. Knselleck, Ibidem,
7. Cf Kosc1Ieck, 'Einlcitung' in Geschichrliche Gnmdhegriffi XXI. On semasiology and anomasiology
see Introduccion, 2.
8. Koselleck, 'Begriffsgcschichrc und S07-ialgcschichte', Soziologie und Soziafgrschichte, 121.
'J. Kcselleck refer.' to this again and again in all of his theoretical drafts.
10, Cf. Koselleck, 'Einleitung' in Geschichtliche Grundbegriffi, p. xvi-xix.
11. On 'context' see Melvin Richter, The History ofPolitical and Social Concept>, A Criticallmrodlletion,
New York/Oxford 1995.
12. Reinharr Koselleck, 'Richtlinien fUr das Lcxikon politisch-sozialer Begriffe der Neuzeir', in Archiofiir
Begnffigeschichte Xl (1967) 81.
13. Reinharr Kosdlcck, 'A Response to Comments on the Geschichrliche Grundbegriffe', in Harrmut
Lehmann, Mdvin Richter (eds.}, The Meaning of Historical 7hms and Concepts. New Studies on
NOTES 251
Beg>4fige5Chichu, Washington D.e., German Hisrorical Insrirute, Washington D.e., {kcasional Pa-
per No 1')(1996)69.
14. On criticism of Gnmdbegrijft, cf especially: Peter von Polcnz. 'Rezension dcr Geschichtlichen
(Jrulldbegrijft Vol. r. in ZeinchrifrfUrgermallislische Linguisrik I (I 973) 235-241; Rcinharr Koselleck
(ed..), Histonsche Scmnncik send Begrijfigeschichu, Stuttgart 1978; joachim Busse, Historische
Semamil? Analyse Programms, Stuttgart 1987; as well as the recent work, lehmann and Richter
(eds.}. The Meaning ofHhroriml 7i:rm, and COllcep".
15. This is commented on severalrimes in reviews of the Lcxiicon, e,g. 1'01el1l" 'Rezension', Zcitschriftfiir
germaniSfische linguistik (1973) 239; and also Husse, Hisiorische Semantik, passim.
16. Rolf Reichardr, 'Einleirung' in: Rolf Rcichardt and Eberhardr Schm!n in collaboration with Ccrd
van den Heuvel and Anetre Hofer (eds.}, Handbuch po/itisch-sozitder Gnmdbegrijft in Franirach,
Munich 198'), pp. 39-148, r 25f.
17. Cf Rolf Reichardr, 'Zur Geschichle polinsch-sozialer Begriffe in Frankreich zwischen Ab,olutismus
und Rcstauration. Vorstellung eincs Forschungsvorhabens' in: Brigitte Schlieben-Lange and joachim
Gessinger (eds.I, Sprachgeschichre und SoziaLgeschichre, ZeilschriJi fir LiteratuTWiJsem,.haft and
Lingllistik 12/47 (1982) 49-74; Reichardr, 'Einlcirung', Ibidem.
18. This is the thrusr of the criticism in, especially, Dictrich Bussc, Hisroriscbr Semamik, 77ff. See also
the contributions of Hampsher-Monk and Van Celderen in this volume.
19. Koselleck uses 'concept' (Begriffi a, a hyponym for 'word'; cf Koselleck. 'Begriffsgeschiehte und
Sozialgeschichte', Soziologie nd SoziaLgeschichte, 119; however, this is not alwap the case; on this, see
Peter von Polenz, Rezension, 237 'Here, concepls, as units of the expressive side oflanguage, are very
much a special class of words (..). On the other hand, concept is also deflned as a unit of the content
side of language.'
20, Cf. Koselleck, 'Richdinicn', Arctiivfiir Begrijfige>chichte (1%7) 86.
21 Cf. Ko,elleck, 'Einleirung' in Gmhichtliche Gnmdbegritfe, xx, xxiif.
22. On the n:conslruction of'lbstraction in terms of logic and language use theory, cl: Wilhdm KamJah,
Paul Lorenzen, Log;,ehe Propiideurik, Vorsrhllle de, veriinnfiigen Rrdcns, Mannheim 1967, 99ff.
23. Cf. Kosdlcck, 'Einlcinmg' m Ge>t:hiehtliche GrundbegriJft, xx, xxiiff.; and Kosdleck,
'Begriffsgeschichrc und Sozialgcschichrc', Soziol"gi,' und Sozialgeschichte, 123; see, on the orher hand,
'Einleirung', xxiii: 'the meaning of words can be defined more exactly, concepts can only be inter-
prered.'
24. Koselleck, 'Richdinien', ArchivfUr Regri}figmhichte (I %7) 86,
25. Cf. for example Kosellcck in 'Richrhnien'. Archiv fUr BegrifJ5gesthithte (1967) 86; and in
'Begritfsgcschichre und Sozialgeschichre', Soziologie und Soziafgeschichre, 124; as wdl as 'Einleitung'
in Geschichtliche Gmndbegrijft, xxiif
26. On linguistic criticism of the general concept of Begri}figesl'hichte, ef especially, Dierrich Busse.
H/'torisrhe Semantik.
27. Kosdleek drew attention to this again and again, for the first time in 'Riehtlinicn', Archil! fUr
Begrijfiglxhirhte(I 967) pam'm.
28. Kosellcck, 'Bcgnffsgcschichrc and So<;ial History' in Economy and Society 11 (1982) 420.
29. Cf. lurgcn Kocka, Anikel 'Angesrclher', in Brunner e.n. (eds.). Gachichtlichc Grundhegriffi, Vol. I,
110"128,herep.122.
30. Cf. Kosellcck, 'Einleirung' in Gesthirhtlich" Grllndbegriffi, panim.
31. Cf. Koselleck, 'Begriffsgeschicllle und Sozialgeschi-=hte', Sozio!ogie ulld Sozialge5chichle, I 18ff., 124f.
32. Koselleck, 'Begriffsgeschichre und Sozialgcschichrc', Sozinlogie ulld Sozialgmhichre, 118fT.
33. ef, for example. Koselleck, 'Begriff,geschichle und Sozialgeschkbre', Soziologie Imd Soziafgeschichte,
118,
34. Ibidem.
35. Ibidem 123.
36. Ibidem 118.
37. Cf Koselleck, 'Begtiffsgeschich[e und Sozialgc'chichte', Soziologie und Sozialgeschichte, 118f.
252 OF
38. Koselle-=k, 'Richtlinien', Archiv ftr Begriffigmhichre (1967) 89.
39. Rolf Rcichardr, "Zur Ceschichre polirisch-sozialer Bcgriffc' in Schlieben-Lange and Gessinger (eds.},
Zeilschrifi ftr Literaucnoissenschafi und Lingui>tik (19!l2) 58. Sec Chapter 12.
40. Clemens Knobloch, 'Oberlegungen l.ur Thcorie dcr Begriffgeschichte aus sprach- und
kommunikationswissenschafrlicher Sichr' in: Archiv fUr BegriffigtJchichte24 (1994) 724, here 22.
41 On the theoretical context, cf. Busse, Historische Semantik, 39ff.
42. Koselleck, 'Einleimng' in Geschichtlicht' Grundbcgriffi, xxii, xiiii.
43. Cf. Koselleck. 'Einleirung' in Geghichtlichc Grundhegriffi, xxii.
44. This was already emphasized in Koselleck, 'Richtlinien'. ArchiufUr Bcgriffigl'St"hichu (1967) 84f; and
in 'Begriffsgesehichte und Sozialgeschichre', Soziologie und Sozialgeschichte, 125. See also Melvin
Richrer, The History ofPolitical and Social Concepts; 47ff.
4'5. Cf earlier, Koselleck, 'Richtlinien', Archiu ftr Begriffigeschichtc (967) 83ff. The danger here of re-
ducing the framework to a mere history of ideas or history of things was explained mosr concisely by
Busse, Hhtorighc Semantik, passim.
46. Koselleck, 'Einlcirung' in Geschichtliche Grundbegriffi, xxiif
47. Cf Koselhk, 'Richrlinien'. Archiv ftr Begriffigeschichu (967) 87.
48. Rolf Reichardt, 'Zur Ge.\chichte politsch-sozialer Begriffe' in: Schlieben-Lange and Cessinger (eds.},
Zeitschrifi ftr Litcraturwiwmchafi und Linguistik (1982) '52.
49. Ibidem 53.
50. On such approaches, Hans-Ulrich Gumbrecht, 'Fur cinc phanomenologische Fundierung der
sozialhistorischen Begriffshistorie', in: Reinharr Koselleck (eds.], Hi$!orischeSemantik, 7'5101.
'51. Clcmcns Knobloch, 'Ubcrlegungcn zur Theorie der Begriffgeschichre', Archiv fiir Begriffigeschlchte
(l994) 10.
'52. On rhe discussion ofmeaning' as 'use', cf. Busse, Historisrhf Sfmantik, 11'5-122.
'53. Ibidem 117.
'54. Kosdkck, 'Einleirung' in Geschichtfiche Grundbegriffi, xxiii.
55. Ibidem xxi.
'56. Kosellcck, 'Response' in Lehmann and Richter (eds.}, The Meaning ofHlslOrical Termsand Concepts,
Occasional Paper No 15 (1996) 61.
57. Kosellcck. 'Einleitung' in Geschichtliche Grundbegriffi, xiii.
58. Cf Koselleck, 'Einleinmg' in Geschichtliche Grundbegriffi, xxvif.
59. Koselleck, 'Einleirung' in Geschichtfiche Grundbegriffi, xxi.
60. Kosellcck, 'Begriffsgeschichte und Sozialgc.\chichre', Sozlologie und Sozialgesrhichtt', 125.
61. Koselleck, 'Sozialgeschichre und Regtiffsgesehichte', in Wolfgang Schieder and Volkcr Sellin (eds.l,
Sozialgeschichte in Dfutschland. Vof. I: Die Sozialgesrhit:hu innerhaIb der Geschichtswissemch'lfi,
Comngen 1986, 86107, here 9'5.
62. Koselleck, 'Probleme der Rclarionsbesnmmung der Texre zur reVolulionarcn WirkJichkei[' in:
Reinharc Koselleck and Roll' Reichardr (eds.}, Dh Frl1n;?)isische Revolution als Bruch des
gescllsrhafilichell Bewuftmim, Munich 1988, 664-666; on Kosellcck's theoretical approaches, see also
Reinhart Koselleck, Hans-Georg Cadamer, Hermeneiaik und HiSlOrik, Heidelberg 1987; and
Rcinharr Koselleck, 'Linguistic Change and the History of Events, in journal ofModem Hiu{)ry GI
(1989) 649-666.
63. Koscllcck, 'Einleirung' in Gcsrhichtliche Grundbegriffi, xxi .
64. Kosclleck, 'Sozialgeschichre und Begriffsgeschiehte', Soziologie und Sozialgmhichte, 94.
65. Koselleck, 'Feindbegriffe', in Deutsehe Akademie ftr Sprache und Dichtung, 1993 Yearbook, 83-90,
here 84.
66. Dlecrich HUger, '12 Thcscn zur Begriffsgeschichce', in Protokot! der Tagung uber Mrrhodenfragen der
polithch-historischen Semantik, MS Bielefeld 197'5, cited in Hans-Kurt Scaulzc, 'Mediavistik und
Begriffsgesehichle', in Koselleck (ed.), HistorischeSemantik, 243f.
67. Rolf Reichardt, 'ZUf Geschichre polirisch-sozialer Begnffe', in Schlieben-Lange and Gessinger (cds.},
Zdtschrifi ftr Lireratursoieenschaji ulld Linguistik (1982) 53.
NOTES 253
68. Koselleck, 'Response' in Lchmann and Richter (eds.I, The Meal/ing ofHisroricai Terms and Concept"
Occasional Paper No 15 (19%) 62.
69. Cr. Busse, HistorischeSemantik, 95f.
70. Kun Rongers, 'Philosophische Begriffsgesehichte', in Dialektik 16 (J 988), 158-176, here 161.
71. Werner Bahner, 'Spracbe und Ceschichrswissenscbafi', in Hans Bleiotreu and Wernet Schmidt (cds.],
Demokrlltie, Amifaschismul ulld Soxialismus in der deutschcn &e>ehichre, Berlin 1988, 322.
72. K05eJIeck, 'Einleitung' in Geschichrliche Grundbegriffi, xxiii: er. also 'Richtlinien', Archiu jUr
Begri./figmhichte (1967) 88.
73. For the fim concise overview from a historian's perspective thar is critical of Begri./figeschichtr:, ef. Pe-
ter Schonler, 'Historians and Discourse Analysis', in History Work,hop 27 (1989) 37-65.
74. Koselleck, 'Response' in l.ehmann and Richter (elk), The Meaning ofHistorical 7erms and Concepts,
Occasional Paper No 15 (1996) 65.
CHAPTER 5
1. See, to mention only a few recent works, Michael Stolleis, Sraat und Siaatrason in der Neuzeir, Frank-
furt am Main 1990; Enzo Baldini (ed.), Borero r la 'Ragion di Stato', Firenze 1992; Maurizio Viroli,
From Politics to Reason ofState, Cambridge 1992; Gianfranco Borrelli, &lgion di Staro e Lcuiatano.
Bologna 1')93; Hans Blom, Morality alld Cauwlity in Politic>. The Rise ofNaturalism in Dutch Seven-
teenth Cmtury Political Thought, Utrecht 1995.
2. See M. Viroli, 'The Revolunon in the Concepr of" Politics', Politiwl Theory, and Id., From Politic, to
RelW)1I ofState, Cambridge 1992.
3. Sec Maurizio Viroli, From Politics to Remo" ofStale, I 170.
4. The DigeJt ofJustillian, 50,13,1.5; I am quoting from The Digest ofJustinian, Th. Mommsen, 1'.
Kriiger, A. Watson (eds.), Philadelphia 1985, vol. IV 929.
5. Cicero, De Finibus Bonorum et Malorum, H. Rac:kham (ed.}, London-New York 1914, 304-5; Seneca
also, referring again to the Peripatetic school. mentions 'civil philosophy' (civil;' philo>ophia) as a par"
ricular type of" a<:tivity along with natural, moral and rational philosophy Epistle 89; I am quoting
from Sen<:c:a, Smna ad Luciiium Eoistulae Morales, R. M. Gummere (ed.), Cambridge Mass.-London
1958, vol. 11 384-5.
6. C. Salutati, De nohilitnte legtlm et medicinae, E. Garin (ed.), Florence 1947, 168.
7. ibidem 17D.
8. ihidem 18.
9. ihidem 198.
10. Franccsco Guicciardini, Dialogo del Reggimmto di Firmu, in E.L. Scarano (ed.), Opere, Turin 1974,
4645.
I I. Translation: 'And because some, engrossed in greed and longing, state that your majesty should never
consent to return Piacenza, which goes against civil reason, recognisisng only reason of state in be-
haviour, I say that that uttering is not only little chrisrian but also and even more, little human'. R.
De Mallei, Jlproblema della 'Ragian di Stato: nelt"eriJ della Ceturonjorms, Milan 1979, 13 n.34. The
Orationewes: written in 1547.
12. Sec Albcno Trucnri, 'Dalla ragion di sraro'' di Machiavelli a quella di Borero', in A. Enzo Baldini
(ed.}, Botero r la 'Ragioll di Smto', Florence 1992, I 121.
13. Translation: 'the situation discussed in this argument, one which can take place between us, should
never be used with others, or when more persons are present'.
14. Among the firsr to point to the importance of the Comulteand Prarichewas Pelix Oilbcrr in his semi
nal essay 'Plorenrine Political Assumptions in the Period of Savonarola and Sodenni', Journal ofthe
Warhurg and Courtauld Imritutes 20 (1957) 187-214.
15. See F. Gilbert, Florentine Political A,mmptiom, 208.
16. Sec F. Gilbcrr, Horentine Political Assumptions. 208.
254 HISTORY C(lt'-,'CFI'TS
17. On the enobling power of the locution 'reason of Stale' "CC Ludovi<,:o Zuccolo, 'Della ragion di scare',
in B. Crocc (ed.), Politics e moralists del Seicento, Ban 1930,33.
18. Translation: 'and this applies to all the others, because all the states, for whom considers their origin,
are violent, except republics, in their own country and not on the outside of it, there is no power
whatsoever which is legitimate, and neither the power of the emperot who is in such great authotity
that he gives reason to the others; and I make no exception from this rule for the priesrs, whose vio-
lence is double because ro keep us under they use spiritual and worldy weapons.'
19. Translation: 'Reason of Slate is the concept of ways to found, conserve and enlarge a dominion made
like this'
20. Tommaso Campanella, Quod reminim'ntur, Padua 1939,62.
21. T.Campandla, Afori,mi politici, Lfirpo ed., Turin 1941, 163
22. Ludovico Zuccolo, Considerazioni Politiche e Morali 50pra unto oracoli d'illustri personaggi al/tichi,
Venice 1621, SS.
23. Ludovico Zuccolo, Delta Ragion di Srato in Crocc, Politici e moralisci, 26.
24. 'La Politica e figlia della ragione e madre delle leggi, la Ragion di Stare e maestra delle tirannidi c
germana dell' ateismo. La Politica, infine, e una pratica cognizionc di rutti que' precerri che insegnano
a' Principi il vcro modo di rettamente governare. reggere e difendere cosl in pace come in guerra i suoi
popoli. La Ragion di State e una intelligenza e cognizione di runi quei mczzi che in qualsivoglia
modo, 0 siano giusri 0 ingiusti, sono isrrumerui a conservare e mantenere chi regna nello sraro
presente. Per quesro la polirica e propria de' principi, la Ragion di Stare de' tiranni', EM, Bonini.
Ciro Politico, Genua, 1647, Proem. The distinction between politics and reason of state was taken up
also by Tommasc Tommasi, to stress that the latter is much more apt than the former to satisfy
princes' curiosity. A prince, he wrote, may find the maxims of politics (massiroe politiche') in S. Tho-
mas, De regimine prindpum and in Aegidius Rcmanus' works. However, he would surely find these
books boring and 100 ordinary. Instead, the books of Machiavelli, Nua and Bodin, where the maxims
of reason of state are properly laid down, will surely provide him with the intellectual nourishment he
is eager for. D.Tommaso Tommasi, II principe srudioso nato ai ,aliigi del scrcniuimo Cosimo grtW
principe di "Tomlnt1, Venice 1642, 106-7.
2S. Filippo Maria Bonini, IlCiro Politico, Venice 1668, 142.
26, Giovanni Leti, Dialoghi poiiuci, 0 ucro la poiaica che usano in quctti iempi. i Prencipi, e le Repubbliche
Iwliane, per comervare i loro Statio e Signorie, Genoa 1966, vol. 172.
27. 'Se s'uccidono gl'innocenti, i Prencipi, 0 vero i loro Ministn, coprono la crudelra col dire la Politim 10
llUole, Se si bandiscono gli Huomini pill necessari al Regno, quell! che regnano dicono subito, la
Politica 1(1 vuole, Se si mandano de' Capirani men valorosi, all'imprese piu difficili, non per altro che
per farli pcrdere la vila, accio non p0rtassero ostaco!o alcuno alla nascente forruna del Privaro, si dira
inconcincntc, la Politi"l 10 Zluole, se s'impoveriscono i piu ricchi, la Poimca lo vuole, se si demoliscono
le Chiese. e si disuuggono gli Altari, la Politica 10vuole, se s'imprigionano senza causa e senza autorita
da poterlo fare gli Ecclesiastic] maggiori, la p(llitim 1(1 vuok, Se s'aggravano i Popoli di gravezzc
insopporrabili, la Polirica 10 uuolc, Se si ruinano l'inrcre bmiglie, la p(llitim 10 Vtwle, se si lascia di
rrarrar la pace, la Politica 10vllok c in sornrna non si faalcun male ne! Prcnciparo, che la Politica non
10 canonizi per un bene, e nicessano di piu', Dialoghi pOlitlci, vol. 11 74-5.
28, G.Leti, Dialoghipolitici, voJ.169-70.
29. Ibidem 76-7.
30. C;iovan Bartista De Luca, It principe cristieno pratico. Rome 1680, 44.
31. Sec Croce (ed.), Politici e Moralisti, 273. See also De Manei, Il pemi"ro politico italian(l ndleta della
ContmrijiJrma, voI.I164-187.
32. F,Jt a general discussion on rhc historic and intellectual significance of reason of state see: NorberlO
Bobbio, 'Ragion di state e modernira", Llnaice(May 1994) 7.
NmES 255
Cnsrren 6
1. Seren Kierkegaard, The rransl, L.M. Capel. London 1%6,47.
2. See, inter alia, R.G. Collingwood, All Alltobiogmph)', Oxford 1939, 61 ft.; Hannah Arendt, Be"
uoeen Pa,t and Furure, expanded edition New York 1968, esp. the essayson 'freedom' and 'authority';
Alasdair Maclnryrc, A Short Hi,tor)' ofEthics, London 1966 and After None Dame 1981.
3. The was coined by Custav Bergmann. Cf. Richard Rorty (ed.), The Lingui,tic 7um, Chicago
1967.
4. Ludwig Wittgensrein, Culture and Vlllue, rransl. Peter Winch, Oxford 1980, 78e.
5. J.L. PhiloJOphical Papers; 2nd edn. Oxford 197U, 201.
6. See my li-anifimlling Politiml Discourse: Politiml Theor)' and Critical Cimuptual J-li,tor)', Oxford
1988.
7. Reinhart Kosclleck, Futures Pmt: Duthe Semlllltin ofHistoriml Time, rtans. Keirh Tribe, Cambridge
Mass. 1985,74, rr.
8. Ono Brurmer, Wern<:r Conze and Rcinharr Koselleck. Geschichrliche Grunbegriffi. Historisches
Lexieon zur PolitischSozialer Sprache in Deullchlllnd, Stuttgart 1972 - ; Rolf Reichardr and Ebcrhard
Schmitt, Handbuch politisth-sozialerGrundbegrifp in hllnkreich, Munich 1985 - . See also the useful
introductions and overviews by Melvin Richter, 'Conceptual History [Begriffigeschichte] and Political
Theory', Political Theory, 14 (1986) 604"37, and 'The History of Concepts and the History of Ideas',
journal ofthe History ofIdeas48 (1987) 247-63.
9. See my Transforming Politiwl Discoerse, eh's 2 and 3.
10. Terencc Ball, Jame, F:Hrand Russcll L. Hanson (eds.], Political lnnouanon and Couceptulll Change,
Cambridge 1989; Ball and J.G.A. l'ocock, Conceptual Changeand the Conninaion, Lawrence Kans.
1988.
11. Bertrand de Jouvend, J.E Huntinton, Chicago 1957, 304.
12. The political who had, 1 believe, the acute appreciation of this aspect of political dis
course are Thucydidcs and Hobb<:s (who, incidentally, was Thucydides's firsr English translator). for
'I'hucydides, sec jamcs Boyd While, When Word, l.osr Their Meaning, Chicago 1984, and my review-
essay, 'When Words Lose Their Meaning', Ethics 97 (l98(,) 62031; J. Peter Euben, ]"he Traged), of
Political Theory, Prjnccron 1990, ch. 6. On Hobbcs. see my Reappraising Politicll! Theor)', Oxford
1995, eh. 4.
13. W.B. Gallic, 'Essentially Contested Concepts', Proceedings IIfthe Aristotelian Societ)', 56 (195519%);
Alasdair Madntyre, 'The Essential Contestahility of Some Social Concept,', Ethic> 84 (1973) \-8;
W.E. (:onnolly, Th,' 7ermsofPoliticalDiscoum, 2nd rev. edn. Princt'ton 1983, ch. 1.
14. See my 'Power', in Roberr E. Goodin and Philip Pcrrir A Companion to Contemporarv Political
Pbilosophy. Oxford 1993, 548-57, 553-6.
15. for a survey and assessment of the disputes over 'republican' political thought, see my Transforming
PoliticalDiJcmme, eh. 3.
1G. This is not, of course, to deny that 'tradition' itself a hotly contested concept. See e.g. Edward Shils,
Tradition, Chicago 1981, and [aroslav Pclikan, The Vindication ofTradition, New Haven 1984.
17. This is raised by James Boyd White in Thinking About Our Language', Yale Lawjournal
96 (1987) 1965G6.
18. I borrow rhe example from Qucurin Skinner, 'Language and Political Change', in Ball et al., Political
Innovation and Conceptual Change, eh. I.
19. Richard Dagger. 'Rights', Politimllnno/illtion, eh. 14.
20. Quentin Skinner, 'The State', Polirical lnnooauon. eh. 5.
21. John Dunn, 'Revolution', Political Innouauon. eh. IG.
22. J. Peter Euben, 'Corruption', Poluicallnnouarion. eh. 11.
23. Mark Coldie. 'Ideology', Poliricallnllovarion, ch. 13.
24. Mary G. Dicrx. 'Patriorism', Political/nnovation, eh. 8.
25G HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
25. This has been emphasized especially by the so-called 'new historians' of the 'Cambridge school'. par-
ucularly Percr Laslen, Quemin Skinner, and John Dunn, as well as such as ].G.A.
Pocock.
26. See !'arr, 'Understanding Conceptual Change Politically', in PoliticallmlfJvarioll, eh. 2,
27. Maclmyre. Short History, 2-3.
28. Contra 'realist' rt'g3rding the irrelevance of authorial intention, see my Reappmiring Poimcal
Theory, 13-14; against assorted 'discourse theorists' of the 'posrmodcrn' see my Transform.
iug PalirimllJiscOIme, eh. I, esp- 7-9.
29, See Arthur Dantn, 'Basic Actions', American Philosophical Quarterly 2 (1965) 141-48,
30. M3rgaret Lcslic, 'In Defence of Anachronism', PoliricaI Studies 18 (1970) 433-47; joseph V, Fernia,
'A Historicist Critique of "Revisicnisr' Mcrhods for Smdying the History of Ideas' repr. in James
Tully (ed.), Meaning and Contest: Quentill Skinner and His (ritics, Princeton 1988, ch. 9.
31. Anronio Gramsci, The Modern Prince, in Prison Writings.
32. See my 'Party' in Polincallnnouation, ch. 7.
33. Skinner, 'Some Problems in the Analysis of Polincal Thought and Action', Meaning and Context, ch.
5, Ill.
34. [urgen Habermas, 'Wahreitsrheorien' in Wirklichkeit un Reflexion. Pfullingen 1973,239.
35. See Ball and I'ocock. 'Introduction'. Conceptual Change and the Constinaion.
36. Skinner, Foundations ofModern Polirical Thought, Cambridge 1978, Vol I xii"xiii.
37. Skinner, 'Some Problems', Meaning and Context, Ill.
38. Karl Marx. 'Eighreenrh Brurnaire' in Political Wrirings, rransl. and cd. David Fernbach, New York
1974, VoL 11146.
CtIAPTF.R 7
I. Michael Oakeshorr, The Voice of Poetry in the Conversation of Mankind' in Michad Oakeshon,
Rationalism in Politin and Other Ehays. London 1967 [1962J 197-247.
1. On the 'unrealistic' nature of this demand see Rudiger Birrner. 'One Anion' in Arnelic Okscnberg
(ed.}, Essa)'l 011 Aristotle's Poetics, Princeton 1992, 97-110.
3. On the 'differenriation of experience' in connection with the introduction of terms see e.g. Srephan
Korncr. Experience and Theory, London 1966, 3-80.
4. This claim [ rake it, is in keeping with the position put forward by Alfred Schutz and his schooL [ am
obviously not denying rhar language as used in the life-world is not in itself functionally differenti-
ated too. The point I want to make is that the differentiation which leads to the rerminologies of the
variou> sciences the linguistic situ3tion of the life-world as its point of departure. See e.g. Alfred
Sdlurz, Problem ofSoda! Reality in Alfred Schcrz, Collecfld Papers, VoL I., The Hague 1973; Al-
fred Schutz I Thomas Luckmann, Strukturt"n der Lebell5wt"!t, Neuwied I Darmsradr 1975.
S. See Thomas Sprat, History ofthe Royal Sodt"ty, London 1667. Facsimile edition London 1959, ed.].l.
Cope and H.W. joncs, 162: ' ...10 separate [he knowledge of Nature, from the colours of Rhetorick, the
devices of Fancy, or the delightful deceit of rables'; Ill: 'this vicious abundance of Phrase, this trick of
Metaphor, this volubility of Tongue...'
6. Reinhart Koselleck, 'Begriffsgeschichte und Sozialgeschichte' in Reinhart Koselleck, Vergmlgene
Zukunji, Frankfurt 1984, 107143, quotations on 113, Wirh a disregard for terminological precision
which, ironically enough, seems a rradcrnark ofsome representatives of Begriffigeschichte, he speaks of
the 'Erfahruflgsr3um' (experiemi31 space] and 'Erwarmngshotimm' (expectational horil.On) of con-
cepts two pages bter.
7. Koselleck, op.cit., 119 f. Transl.: Now a word can become unambiguous in use. A concept, by con-
trast, must remain polysemic in order to remain a concept. True, the concept, too, attaches to a word,
but at the same time it is more than a word: a word becomes a concept once the plenitude of a politi-
cal-social context of meaning and experience, in which a word i, used, enters into that one word. [... ]
NOTES 257
Aword contains possibilities of meanings, a concept, by contrast, unites in itselfa plenitude of mean-
ing. Therefore a concept may be clear, bur it must remain polysemous.
8. See Paul Ricoeur, Freud ana Philosophy. An EJJay on Imerpmauon. Tr. Denis Savage, New Haven!
London 1970,20-36.
9. Sec the analysis of the use of language in Perer L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann, The Soda! Con-
struction ofRealiry, Harmondsworth 1971.
10. Koscllcck refers ro his discipline as a 'norwendige Hilfe fur die Sozialgeschichte' (a necessary aid of
social history).
11. I am here adapting the Kanrian notion of an 'Archirckrcnik' of the sciences: ' ... urn nach einem
wohlgeordntlen und zweckmalligm Plant bci dcr Erweirerung seincr Erkenntnisse zu Werke Zll
gthcn, mull man also Jenen Zusammenhang der Erkennrnise uutcr cinander kennen zu lerncn
suchen. Dazu gibt die Archirckronik der Wissenschaft Anleirung, die ein System nach Idem isr, in
wt'khem die Wissenschafltll in Anschung ihrer Verwandrschafr und sysltmalischm Verbindung in
cincm Canzen der die Menschheir inreressierenden Erkennrnis bcrrachrer werden.' Immanuel Kanr.
Logik, Einleitung VI. A 68, in Kant, Wake in aIm Banden. Ed. W. Weischedel, Darmstadt 1958,
475.
12. See e.g. Rolf P. Horstmanu. 'Kritcncu [ilr Grundbegriffe' in Reinharr Koselleck, Hisroriscbc Semantik
und Begri/figeschichre, Stuttgart ]978, 37-42.
13. 11G. Gadamer, Wahrheit l/IId Me/hode, 2nd ed. Tlibingen 1965, 284 ff.
14. Cadamer, op. cu.. 285.
15. Erkh Rothacker, 'Cclcirwcrc'. Anhiv fiir Begri/fignchhhtl' 1 (1955) 5.
16. Reiner WiehL 'Begriffsbesrimmung und IkgrifEgeschichre' m RUdign Bubner et aL (ed,.),
Hermeneutik und Dialekfik vol. 2, TLibingen 1970, 167-213; quotation on 181.
17. There obviously would be liede need for a hi'!"ry of concepts if Kuhnian 'normal science' were to
prevail forever.
18. l-or an overview of recent narrative theory see Shlornith Rimmon-Kenan, Narrativl' Fier/fm: Contem-
porary Poetics London 1983.
19. For the paired concepts of reut and h;,to/re of narrative theory ,ee Rimmon-Kenan, Narrative Fiction.
20. See Gadamer, Wahrheit ulld Met/lode, 283[f. et paim.
21. With the disrincrion between 'causally based' and 'semiotically' and thus 'conventionally based' I am
adapting for my purposes tbe distinction between 'causal generation' and 'conventional generation'
which Alvin I. Gold man developed in his A Theory ofHumall Aaioll, Princcrcn 1970,22-25.
22. See e-s- John Lyons, S(mantic; vol. L Cambridge 1')77, ')4-99.
23. For a detailed discussion the procedures which art' used in turning everyday language predicates into
rerrns see e.g. Wilhdm Kamlah I Paul Lorerrzen, Logi;che Propddeutik. VOTlchllle des verniinftlgen
Redo/;, 2nd ed. Mannheim 1972,64-78.
24. It should be noted, however, that in th<: p r o ~ ~ of dc-conrcxrualiz.ing the terms of a disciplinary rep-
ertoire lhey are de facto heing re-conrextualizing. Only this rime the contexts are not the 'contingent'
ones of the life-world but the planned ones of the various terminological systems into which these
lerm, enter in the proce.\.\ of definition and explication. Raising problem-hisroncal and
'wirkungsgeschichtlichc' questions with regard to the terminological repertOIre of a particular disci-
pline therefore characrcrisncally takes on {he form of enquiring into the 'paradigm' (Kuhn) or rhc
'epistem,,' (FoucauJr) underlying or informing the terminological system as a whole.
25. For the following discussion of the difference bt'!ween rht' 'nomenclature' and the 'terminology
proper' of literary scholarship 1 am indebted ro Janusz Slawinski, 'Probleme der
lirerarurwissenschafrlichen Terminologie' in Janus'! Slawinski, l.itaatuT ab ,ptem und Proz,1J, Tr.
from Polish by RolfFiguth, Muncher, 1975,65-80.
26. Ariswrk PoeticJ', ch. 8.
27. The third edition of the Reallexikon der DelltiCht'lI Lit(rdturwi"emrhaji of which the first volume has
been published, edited by Hatald frick<: er aI" Berlin 1997- . Thi, lexicon was first published in four
volumes between 1925 and 1931 under the title Rcalicxikon der Deurschen LirerawrgeJchichu with
258 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
Paul Mcrker and Wolfgang Stammler as editors. A second edition with the same title was published
in five volumes between 1955 and 1988 under th", editor.\hip of Werncr Kohlschmidr and WoIfang
Mohr. Wirh the rhird edition which is heing edited by Harald Klaus Grubmuller, [an-Dirk
Muller and Klaus Weimar, the title has been changed from Reallexikon der Dcutschen
LitertllUrgesrhithteto Realtexikon der Deutschen Uteratllrwissemchaft. This change in title undoubtedly
reflects the greater degree of methodological rigour which entercd literary scholarship in the wake of
the 'linguistic turn' of the early seventies.
28. Se", e.g. Victor Erlich, Russian Formalism: History - Doctrine, The Hague J955.
29. Seee.g. Roberr Weimarm, 'New Criticism' und die ntwicklung biirger1icher LireralUrwissemchaft, Mu-
nich 1974 2nd. ed.
.30. Karl R. Popper, The Logic ofScientific Di>coVI7J, New York/Evansron J965, 31.
3 J. I am leaving aside the further distinction between the 'factual' and the 'normative' justification of a
concept.
32. It should be notcd that the threc disciplinary archirecronics we have identified are not to be under-
stood as rrH:ta-leve\ affairs only.
33. R. Camap and W. Stcgmuller, ]nduktive Logik und Wahrgheinlichkeit, Vienna 1965, 15; J- E Hanna,
'An Explication of "Explicarion'" , in Philo>ophy ofScience 35 (1968) 28-44.
34. See Jorg Zimmermann, 'P.sthetische Erfahrung und die 'Sprache der Natur", in J. Zimmermann
(ed.), Sprache und Wdterfahrung, Muncher, 1979, 234-256, csp. 235 f.
35. Sec my 'Porschungsbericht' on the publication history of rhe Emblemawm liber: 'The 1531 Augsbutg
Edition of Alciaro's Emblemata: A Survey of Research' in Emblemarica. An interdisciplinary journal for
Emblem Swdies 5 (1991) 213-254.
CHAPTER 8
I. Rolf Reichardr, 'Einleirung' in Handbuch l, Muncher, 1985,64. See also my reviews of The volumes I
to VI and VIII to X in Tij'd,chrift ooor Geschiedenis 100/1 (1987) 100-101; 100/4 (1987) 597-598;
J02/4 (1989) 587-'588.
2. Cf. the sp<:dal issue 'Histoire er sciences sociales. un rournanr critique', Annairs ESC44/6 (1989)
J3J 7" 1520, and several articles on the similar themes in later issues.
.1 Cf. Peter Burke, Hhtvry and Social Theory, Cambridge 1992.
4. This ambiguity is deady reflected in the conception of Peter Dinzelbacher's dictionary EurvpiiiKhe
Menratiriirwe.fchichte. Hallptthemen in Einze(darsreLlungen, Stuttgart 1993. See his definitions on IX-X
and XXI.
5. In Peter Burke (ed.], New Perspecnues on Historical Writing, Cambridge 1991, the term 'new history'
is, <:.g., <:onsi.'itmtly used for what others may call the '(new) cultural history', almost all the chapters
are concerncd with cultural themes or rnerhods: minohisrory, oral history, reading, images, the body,
political thought, narrative. See for the 'new cultural history' Lynn Hunt, 'History, Culture and Text'
in eadem (ed.), The New Cultura! History. Berkeley/Los Angeles 1989, 1-22.
6. Hans Ulrich Gumhrecht, RoIf Reichardt and Thomas Schleich, 'Fur einc Soztalgeschichte der
Franzosischen Aufldarung' in Sozialgeschkhte der Aufkliirrmg in Prankreich, 2 vol., Munich/Vienna
1981.vo1.13-'51.
7. Reinhan Kosellcck, 'S,nialgeschichte und Begriffsgeschichte' in Wolfgang Schiedcr and Volker Scllin
(cd,.), Soz/algeschichte ill Deusecbiand. Enrwickbmgm IInd PerspektilJfn im intrrnationaien
LlIsammmhallg, vol. I, Coniugen 1986, 89-109. See Chapter 2, passim.
8. Cf. Reichardt, 'Einleirung' in Handbuch, I 51-64. For the evolution of historical semantics, see also
Robert JUne, Abbild und ,oziale Wirklichkeir des Beuier- und Gaunertnms zu Begifln der Nelluir.
Sozial-, lIud spmchgeS<'hichrliche Srudien zum l.iber Vagatorum (1510), Cologne/Vicnna
1988,1-25. Purrhcr rhc discussion in Mclvin Richter, 'Con<:eptual history (Begriffsgcschichtel and
political theory', Political Theory 14/4 (1986) 604-637; jercmy Rayner, 'On Regriffsgcschichte', ibid.
16/3 (1988) 496-501; and Richter's rejoinder. ibid. 17/2 (1989) 296-301.
NOTES 259
9. Antoine de Baecque. Le ClJrps de f'hi>toirc MhaphlJrc5et pulitique 0770- 1800), Paris 1993.
10. For American scholarship, see the <.:ontribution ofTerencc Ball on 'Conceptual history and the his-
tory of political rhoughr' in this volume.
11 The second volume bears a different, but equally programmatic title, 1'. Burkc and R. Porter (eds.),
Language, Selfarid Societ)', Cambridge 1991.
12. Cerd van den Heuvd, 'Cosmopoiirc, Cosmopoliftijsme' in Handbuch, VI, Munchen 1986,41-55.
13. For a critical appraisal of Etasmus's position, see A. Wesseling, 'Are the Dutch uncivilized? Erasmus
on Batavians and his nanonal idcmiry', Erasmui ofRaaerdasn Society Yearbook 13 (1993) GIl-102.
14. The opposition meanr here is, of course, between 'ecclesiastical' and 'lay', rhus between twO institu"
tional concepts, not between 'religious' and 'agnostic' (or similar terms), i.e. between twO cognitive
concepts. Erasruus of Rotterdam certainly was a true believer with a profoundly Christian world-
view, but his position towards church organisation WJ, rather and in his view the authority
of learning was beyond mere institurionalrnotivarion.
15. er M. Crossmann, Humanism at Wirtenberg 1485-1517, Nicuwkoop 1975.
Hi. CL my chaprer 'Parrerns' in Waiter Rtiegg (general ed.} and Hilde de Ridder-Symoens (cd.}. A His-
tory ofthe Ullivmity ill Europe, VG!. I! Universities in Et/rry Modem Europe 0500-1800), Cambridge
1996.
17. Fur the French reference.s, I refer ID the foowmes of rhc HarIdbueh enrry.
18. E.g, [Michael Scndivogius]. Cosmopolitc, dat is Borgher der Were/t, ofte her niemoe iichr van de
werew,.hnp uan llafllurLycke dinghm, transl. by Alba Starkse in Hem, Amsterdam, N. Biesrkens 1627;
Cosmopolise, 014 Nouvelle [unurre de III ph)'Siqlle I/(lfurel/e, rransl. from Latin into French by Le Sr. de
Bosnay, The Hague, Thcodcrc Maire. 1(,40; Le Cosmopoiae. ou Nouvelle lunuire chymiqlle, inrrod. by
Bernard Roger, Paris 1976; Cosmapoiuac hisroria naruralis, comprehendcns humani corporis ntomiam er
anatomiram ddillelltiollem, Leiden 16116; jacques de Nuysement, 7;IIUatui de uerophilosaphorum ,ale
srcreto er uniocrsali mundi spintu. in supplemellfllnl dill desidrran Cosmopoiaae. Frankfurt am Main
1716. alcftemical meaning is not mentioned In the Halldbllch.
19. Cr. Pier<> Picrotn, "'Cosmopoli.,''': un narrate mai 'critto', Rivi,ta italil/!la di ,tudi napoleollici 17/2
(1980) 99-102, review of Giuseppe M. Haltaglini, Comwpoli, Portofrrraio medicea. Staria urbana
1548-/7.37(1978l-
20. A century later, the editor of the Dutch specrarorial periodical De Kosmopoliet, ofwaere!dbllrger,
which appeared for two whole (Amsterdam, 177(,-1777), proclaimed his universal parriorism in
these terms: 'Hence 1 consider the world d.' my fatherland, hence 1am a world citizen, a cosmopoli-
[an' (Vol. J nr. 3, 1776). er \'(IoordenhoekderNl'derlalld"he laa/VJl2, The Hague/Lciden 1941, col.
5755-5756.
21. This penodizanon and this negative image of France, tradilional among eight<:enth"century special-
ists, may well he challenged. Firvrly, bOlh in idea and in r<:ality, the Republic of Letter, much older
than Enlightenm<:nt scholarship rends to believe. Cf the contributions to HaIlS Bots and Francoisc
Waqu<:t Cammacium littrrarinrn. FOr/m ofcommunication ill the &public Letters 1600-1750,
Amsrerdarn/Maarsscn 1994. Secondly, in her contribution 'Lespace de la Republique l.cnrcs'
(ibid., 175"190), 1'. Waquet point, out that one has to distinguish between Paris, the true capital of
the R<.'public of Letters Slll<.'tc the early seventeenth century, and the French provlIlce, but this
disrincnon is more a case of representation than of rCJlity.
22. Cl". the social and geographical analysis by L. VOC[, 'Erasmus and his corrc.\pondmts', in J. Sperna
Weiland and WTh.M. Frijhuff (cds.}, Emsmus of Rotterdam: rhe man and the Jcholar, Leidcn 1988,
195-202.
23. Anthony Crafron, jweph Swliga. A Study in rhe Hi,tory Scholarship, 2 vol., Oxford 1983-
1993; idem, Defendm ofthe hxt. haditiom of.':'"dJOlaY>hip ill all Age Science. 1450-1800, Cam-
bridge Mass./London 1991.
24. Ono S. Lanknor$t, Reinier LaY> (1654-1714), lIirgwer 01 boekverkoper re Rotterdam, Amsterdam/
Maarssen 1983.
260 HIS'JURY OF (;()NCl'I'TS
25. Cr. w. Frijhoff, 'L'usage du francais en Hollande, XVI!c-XIXc siccles: propositions pour un modele
d'inrerprcrarion', Etudes de linguistique appfiquie, nouv. ,<'fie, 78 (avril-juin 1990) 17-26; same au-
thor, 'Le plurilinguisme des dites en Europe de l'Ancien Regime au debut du XXe sieclc', Le Frallp,i,
dam le Monde, Recherchcs er applielltiom, a special issue edited by D. COlICand J. Heluard, 'Vers le
plurilinguisrnc des elites' (Feb.-March 1991) 120-129. Rcversely, anglomania scrvcd in France in Ihe
second half of the eighteenth century as an anri-cosmopoliran catalyst in the creation of nati')l1al
identity. er. josephine Grieder. Anglomania in France 1740-1789: Paa,fiction, andpolitical difloum:,
Genevc 1985.
16. er. Paul Hazard, 'Cosmopolhc' in Milange, dhistoire genemle et comperee offirts (/ Ferdinand
Baldewperger I, Paris 1930, 354-364; Ren" Pomcau, L'Europe de, Lum;ere' er u'litl
europlnme au XV1lfe ,'iec!e, Paris/Cencvc 1981.
27. Th.J, Schlcrerh, The cosmopolitan idetl! in Enlightenment rhoughr. Itsform and[uncnan in the of
Frank/in, HUIe and Voltaire, J694-1790, London 1977. For the German>, see Hans- Wolf Jager,
'Weltbtirgertum in der deurschen Lehrdichrung', Rmuc d'Al!emagne 18/4 (l986) 600-611, and ether
articles in this thematic issue on Cosmopolitisrn.
28. Published in The Hague, 1750. Others have London 1753 as the firsr edition. New ed. inrrcd. by R
Trousson, Bordeaux 1970.
29. Cr. j .. p de Beaumarchais, 'Fougeret de Monrbron, Louis Charles', in J .. P. de Beaumarchais, D.
Coury and A. Rey (cds.), Dictionnaire des iiueraturee de {anguefianfaise I, Paris s.a.. 836837.
30. On R"usscau and cosrnopolirism. see joscph Texrc, Rousseau er les du
tosmopoliliJme HI/haire: itude sur les relations litliraires de la France er de l'Angleterre au XVIlle siede,
Paris 1895, Ze ed. 1909; repr. Ceneve 1970.
31. J.W. Oerlcmans, ROIweau er! de privatisering van het bewuslzipl. Carrierisme en cultuur in de
achttiendc eeuw. Groningen 1988.
32. Rousseau, ed. Launay, !Il21; quoted from Van den Hcuvel, 'Cosmopohre', 47.
33. Cf. Predenck M. Barnard, 'National culture and political lcgirimacy: Herder and Rousseau', journal
oj'lhe History oj'Idw44 (1983) 231253.
34. Roberr Darmon, 'The high Enlighrenmenr and the low-life oflirerarure in pre-rcvolutionary France',
1'a,'1 & I'mcnt 51 (1971) 81-115; French tram!' in Bohemc fiU/mir<: et Rivoluti{)f/. Le monde des lillm-
au XVIIle siede, Paris 1983; Roger Chanier, 'Espace social el imaginairc social: le> imclknuels
Frusrrcs au XVllle siecle', Annales ESC 37 (1982) 3R9-400; Elizabeth L Ei.\cnsrein, Grub Street
abroad. Aspects ofthe French cosmopolitan prmfrom the Agt ofLou;, XIV to the French Relloludon, Ox-
ford and New York 1992; and my chapter 'Graduation and Careers' in Ruegg, Hi,tory ofthe UlJiller-
J'ity, Vo!. 11.
.35. The author is said to be Charles Elie Denis Roonptsy, maitre du eaffi. The text was published in Am-
sterdam, s.n. 1778 (2d prinring 1778).
36. Anacharsis Ctoors. Voeux d'un Callophile, Amsterdam 1786; La Republique uniucrsdle, ou Adrme IIIL'(
tyrannicides, Paris 1792; rrmnes aux cosmopolita, Paris 1793. On Cloots: Albert Marhiez, La
Reoolntion et les itranger,: et difeme naaanale. Paris 1918, 4s-57; Alben Soboul.
'Anacharsis C1ools', Annnla hissoriques de la Revolution franraise 52 (1980) 29- 58.
37. On this problem, sec: Jean-Rene Sueaneau. 'Cosmopolitisme et parriorisrne au Sii:de des Lumicres',
A"nale, historiqueJ' de la RIM/ution frallfaise 55 (l983) .364-3R9; Jean Moes ']UStuS Miher: patriote
Cosffiojlolite ou nauonalisrc xenophobe?', Revue d'A!lemag>le 18/4 (1986) 637-649; Marha GilIi,
"Cosmopolitisrne et xenophobic pendant la Ripublique de Maycne<:-', ibidem 705-715. Cr. Crieder.
Anglomania, 117-146.
38. Virginie Guiraudon, 'Cosmopolitisrn and national priority: arrirudcs roward. foreigners in France be-
rwcen 1789 and 1794', ofEuropean Ideas 13/5 (1991) 591-604.
39. er. my Rotterdam inaugural lecture ClIlrullr, menrafil!it: illmin van elite,?, Nijmegen 1984. [also
published as 'Kulrur und Memalirac 1Ilu,iunen "on Elncnr', rransl. by Cerhard jaritz, Dsterr!ichische
Zeitschrifi fur Gesehiehtwi"emchafien 2{1 (1991) 7-33]
NOTES 261
40. er Harry Senn, 'Folklore beginnings in France: the Academic celnque, 1804-1813', journal ofthe
Folklore Imfitutl' 18 (1981) 2333; Mona Ozouf 'Linvention de l'erhnographie francaise: le ques-
tionnaire de l'Academie celtique', Annates E')C 36 (1981) 2\ 0-230, And for the context in a broader
perspective: W. Frijhoff, 'Vo1kskundigen vocr de volkskunde?", Volk,kllndig Bsdlerin. Tijdschrifi noor
Nederltlndu cultllurweremchtlp2013 (1994) 245-267.
41. er c.g., Pricdnch Wolflettel, Cc dbir de IJtlgtlbondage cosmopolite. Wege und Enrwickbmg de,
fm.nziJsischen Reisebnichts im 19. j"hrhundert, Tubingcn 1986; Marrina Lauster (ed.), Deuueh/'md
und der europiii,che 7eitgeisf- Kosmopolitischc Dimcnsioncn in dcr Litertlfur de, Vormiirz;, BieleFekl
1994.
CHAf'TER 9
1. See the study of Georg Bollenbeck, Rildung und Kulwr. Clallz und Elend eina deutschen
Dmtungsmusters, Frankfurt/Leipzig 1994.
2. [Bertrand) Barere, lWpporf IlII Comite de Salut Public JIIr les idiomes. 8 p/lIIliose an IJ, reedited in
Michel De Cerreau. Dorninique julia, jacques Revel, Une Po/itique de la /angue. La Reoolurion
fttlllftll,e er les patois. Paris 1975 (Bibliotheque des Hisroires) 291-299, here 294, where the Italian
dialect spoken on the island of Corsica is called a 'foreign language'.
3. Aleida Assmann. Arbeil am narionalcn Mythos, Eine kuru Geschichre der daaschcn Bi/dungsidee,
Prankfun/M 1994,33.
4. Ernst Troeltsch, Hun/{/ui,mus und Ntlti'JlItllisnluS in umerem Bildunpwesm, Berlin 1917, 42; quoted
by A,smann, Arbeit, 85.
5. Thi, result, from the exploration of almost '50 French-German dictionaries of the period 1770-1820
in the context of the research project 'Wissens-, Begriffs- und Symbolrransfer von Prankrcich nach
Deutschland, 1770-1820' sponsored by the Volkswagen Foundation and directed by H.-J. Luschrink
and R. Reichardr.
6. Ahcenc Abdellfenah, Dil' Reuprion der Fmneosischen Revolution durch den politischen iiffinrlichen
Sprtlrhgebraurh. Untersucbr an tlllsgl'lI'dhlrm historisch-politischrn Zeitsctmfien (J 189-1802),
Hcidclbcrg 1989, 205213.
7. Neues deutsrh-ftanzihiscIJes Wiirtnhlllh. F.in HU/fimittel zur bcquemen Anwendung der neuern
fttlnziisischen Worter IInd Redmsttrten. Ntlch D. Lconard Snetlage, 'Nouvetlu Dicuonnaire Frall(ais
contrnant Its expressions de nouoellecreationdu Peuple- Fmncais', mit Abkurzungen, Zu,iitzen und einern
fttlnziisiuhm Register von Fncdrich Lacostc. Leipzig 1796, 114: 'Nationa1mordcr', 'Nation;cide',
'Einer, der dcr Nation nachtheilig ist (Ludwig der Nationmorder, "Louis le Narionicide")'.
8. Ibidem 136.
9. 'Verschiedenheiren I...] die Aufmerksamkcn des Ccscrzgcbcrs auf sich zichen muGte', Ibidem 137.
10. [Anon.], 'Da<; groGe Nanonal-Fesr in Paris. Von eincm Sraarsmann, dcr in Einsamkeitlebt', Min(rvtt
7 (153-1806) 166-17'5, here 167: Tin sokhe, National-Fesr wic jetzt dcr Kayser Napoleon
veransralrer. war bey der chemaligcn Riimischen Nation sehr gebrauchlich.. es dicnre sowohl urn ihrc
GtoRe den Volkem scben zu lassen, als urn ihre Armeen und Feldherren noch mehr rnir Ruhm und
Ehrbegier ZlI belebcn.'
11. [Anon.), 'Ueber die frauzosischen 0:'a[ionalfestc', journtll der neuestm Wdrbege-benheiten 6.1 {I800}
193-199, here 193.
12. Translanon: 'The author doesn't mention rhe military celebrations, which always impressed most.
The military music, (he national hymns, the trophies wnn, the onlook of wounded soldiers and the
urns, dedicated to rhc deceased heroes, filled the onlookers with holy veneration and high esteem.
Buonaparte would not neglect rhese parades Juri/Ig the wm'. Ihidem 199, footnote.
13. Sce Schuban, 'National-Verlust', Obcrdcutsche At/gemeine Literttturzeitung (5-4" 1803) col. 455-456.
14. The rransiarcd work of L.M. Rcvcilliere-IA.'peallx' Rtf/exiom sur le cu/te, SUT In dremonies civiles erSUT
les fires nnrionaies appeared in 1797, the same year as the original. Maximilien Robcspicrre, 'Rapport
262 HISTORYOF CON(:Fl'TS
des Prnsidenren Robespierre uber die National- und Dekadenfesre' in IV (1794) 513-570; M.
Robcspicrre, Uber die Nationalfisu der F"ranz0$(11. 'ine Rede oon Robespierre, gehalten in der Sirzung
des am 7. May 1794, Alrona 1794, 62; see also on this point Heinz Schuffenhauer, Die
Piidagogikjohann Gottlieb Fiehtei, Berlin 1%3, 88; Manfred Buhr, Revolution und Philoiophie, Berlin
1965, 78. For Merder see for example his publication 'Ober den Narionalmurh. Geschrieben im
Januar 1792', Minerva 3.1. (1792) 482-494; Louis-Marie Jacques Amalrk Comre de Narbonne-Lara,
National-Bundnis. ZuschrJji der Pariser Burger an alle Franzosen, Sttal1burg 1790, 12; Amalric, 'Die
Nation der Franken an die Teutschen (ein Plugblan)', poiitischcsJournal I H. 10 (May
1792) 508-509; Amalr!c, 'Ueber den Narional-Charakrcr der Franaosen in Hinsichc auf ihre Consti-
tution', Mincrua 5.2 H. 6 (I792) 523-528; Amalric, 'Ueber Narional-Wurde und National-Gluck',
Mineroa G.1 (I797) 2G-31; L. M. Reveilliere-Lepeaux, Berrachtungen uber den Gotwdicmt,
biirgerlicheGcbriiuche und Narional-Fcste. Aus dem Franziisischen ubersetzt von C. Fabricius, Ham-
burg 1797, 45-47.
15. Seeon this point Hans-jurgen Ltlsebrink, "Hommage a l'ecrirure" et "Eloge de l'imprimerie''. Traces
de la perception sociale du livre, de l'ecrirure et de l'imprimerie a l'epoque revolutionnaire' in
Frederic Barbier, Claude Joly, Sabine juraric (eds.), Liore er Revolution. Colloque organise par
d'Hisroirc Moderne et Conremporaine (CNRS), Paris, Bibliotheque Nationale, 20-22 rnai
1987, Melanges de la Bibliorheque de la Sorbonne 9 (Paris 1989) 133-144.
IG. See on this point the article of [Christoph Martin Wie!andJ, 'Ober deurschen Parriorismus,
Benschrungen. Fragen und Zweifel', DN mue Teuwhe Merkur 5 (May 1793) 17-18, which distin-
guishes sharply between the French 'Nazional-Patriotisrnus' and the German 'reurscher Patriotisrnus'
defined as 'Cemeingeisr' (common spirit).
17. Emsr Moritz Arndt, 'Ober deursche Art und das Welschtum bci uns' in E.M. Arndt, Grist der Zen;
A.hona, 1806. Reprinted in: Amdts \Verke. Amwahl in 12 Teilen mit EinlcitUllg und Anmerkungen
ocnchcn, A. Leffson and W. Sreffens eds., Berlin 1912, 9th pan, 151: 'Wer sie [die Fremdsprachc] von
Jugend an ubt und rreibr, der muR seine Anschauungen und Cedankcn und Gefilhle notwendig
gegen den Spiege! stellen, der muB das angeborene Deusrche endlich vcrkehrr erblicken und das
cigcnrurnlich Eigene mull ihm nuf immct cin verschlossenes Rarsel bleiben.'
18. Emsr Moritz Arndt, Ueher Volhhajl und dm Gebrauch einer frmldm Spmche, Leipzig 1813, 35, 39:
'Das heilh die Sprache isr ein Spiegel des Volkcs, das sic spricln: aus der Sprache eines Volkes
erscheinr mir hell, was es will, wohin es srrebr. wohin es sich neigl, was cs am mcistcn liebr und ubr,
kurz, wohin sein cigcnrliches Leben und Srreben gehr. [...]. Man siehr jctzt, wohin ich will. Ich will
die Uebung und den Gebrauch der franzosischen Sprache in 'Ieurschland abgeschaffr wissen.'
19. The quoted concepts can be found in all of Arndt's works after 1804/06, and with a special density in
the quored article 'Ober dcutsche Art und das Welschtum bei uns'.
20. See Arndt, Deutsche Art, 34: 'Bei den meisren wird diescs Mischmasch des Verschiedenen, in den
jahren eingetricbrert, wo sie die erszten einfalrigen Bilder des Lebcns auffassen und aus sich
enrwickeln sollen. einc schwachliche und f1ache Charakterlosigkeit erzeugen.'
21. See Ibidem 142,138,130.
22. Translation: 'Also I SWOt hot bloody hate, and deep anger wirhout remorse to the Frenchmen and the
French agression which harms our German land'. Ernst Moritz Arndt, Dn deutscben Knaben Pobert
Schwur, in Arndt, 1X'erke Part I Gedichu, W. Steffens (ed.), 128.
23. Arnd[, Art, 139: 'Darum laBt uns die nur recht frisch hassen, laBt uns unsre
Franzosen, die Entehrer und unserer Kraft und unschuld, nur noch frischer wo wir
fuhlen, daB sie uns unsre Tugend und Starke verweichlichen und enlllerven! Ah Deutsche, ab Yolk,
bediirfen wir dieses Gegensarzes, und unsere Vater waren ein vie! besscres Volk, wir jetzt ab
der Gegensatz und Widerwille gegen die Welschen am lebendigsten war.'
24. Erosr Moritz Arndt, Obey Situ, Mode und Kleidcrtracht. Ein Wort am UnJerer Zeit, Frankfurt/M.
1814, 12: 'Wir Deutschen blciben e1ende Knechte, wenn wir die fremde An, Sine und Sprache nicht
aus unseren Granzen vertilgen und auch unser Volk, unsere Art und unsere Sine nicht ailS dem Stolz
erfassen, den wir verdienen.'
NOTES 263
25. See on rhis point the useful, bur very incomplete and not very precise dissertation of Chang Tien-Lin,
Die Au,einanderutzu'/g . M. ArndtJ mit Frtwk,eicb. Inaugural-Dissertation, Tubingen 1940.
26. 'Weil der Narionalgeisr fehlt, isr ein Volk von 30 Millionen der Spon Europens geworden'. Ernst
Moritz Arndt, Rdsen durcb einen tal Teutsrhland" Ungarm, italiem und Franireichs in den [ahren
1789 und 1799 {3rd part}, Leipzig IR04, 204.
27. Ernst Moritz Arndt, De' Rhein. Deutschlands Strom, aba nicht Deutschtands Crena, Leipzig 1813,
new ed. Munchen 1921, 7-8: 'Bald ward auch das ncugcmachte Konigreich Holland vcrnichtet, Hol-
land hieB eine Anspulung der franzosischen Strbrnc und war in cine [ranzosische Landschafr
verwandelr.'
28. See on the concept of semi-orality (combining written texts and oral performances in different ways,
theatre, readings, erc.) which has been created in Germany especially by Fritz Nies. See for example
his article "Zeir-Zeichen''. Gattungsbildung in der Revolurionsperiode und ihre Konsequenzen fur
die Lireratur- und Ceschichrswissenschafr', Fmncie8 (1980) 257-275; and his book Bahn IInd Ben
and BliitmduJt. Eine Raise durrh die Weir der Lcserbilder; Dannsradr 1991, esp. 77, 81, 113-114; and
the whole subject Hans-Jurgen 'Serni-Oralirar. Zur lircrarurwissenschafrlichen Tragweite
eincr provokariven Karegorie' in Offine Ceftge. Fmschrifi ftr Fritz Nil's zum 60. Ceburmag, Henning
KtauB ed., wirh Louis Van Dclfr, Gert Kaiser and Edward Reichel, Tubingen 1994, 152.
29. See on this point Hans-jurgen Lusebrink, "Lappel au pcuple. l'aposrrophc aux rois" - zur Rherorik
offcntlicher Rede im Frankreich der Sparaufklarung.' Aktea des Potsdamcr Kolloquiums 1993. Hans
Erich Bodeker, Erienne Prancois eds., Aufkliirungl tumiem und Politik, Leipzig J995.
30. Ernst Moritz. Amdr, Aufruf all die DeutSthen ;;,um gemdnSfbaJtlichen Kampft gegen die Franzosen.
Elldlirhes Schirksal Napolcons, vorhergesagt im Jahre 1806 IJIm A. von Kotzebue. Die Siimmc in der
Wu,re all acbte Dcuuche, Berlin und Halle 1813, 11: 'Win Ersrcn: Bleibt Eurem Charakrer auch in
jedem Verhalmisse gerreu! Seyd gerechr gegen Frcund und Feind! I... ]. Zum Zweiren: Tausendfklrige
Beweise habt ihr, daB Eures Peindcs Werk Lug und Trug ist. Lasset Euch daher nicht wankemuthig
machen durch seine scheinheiligen und gleillnerischen VorspiegcJungen, wenn er von semen
Absichten: durch seine unverschamren Prahlcreien, wenn er von seinen Thuren spricht.'
CHAPTeR 10
1. Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Class and What Afire Found There, in The Annotated Alice,
Harrnondswcrrh 1972,265. For corrections and inspiration, I thank Daan den Hengst, David Rijscr,
Frans Slits, Chris Heesakkers, Machreld Bolkesrein, Johan Heilbrcn and Erie Moormann.
2. To give juSt one example from L. Dussler, Raphael. A Critical Catalogue ofhis Pictures, Wall-Paintings
and 'lapestries, London 1971: 'Neither this theory [Vasari's), which indicates a complete misunder-
standing of the theme, nor an interpretation based on rhc writings of Sr. Bonavenrura, put forward
by Gutman, requires refutation' (73). And Schlosser's thorough investigation of the programme of
themes in the Stanza dclla Segnatura and its predecessors leaves no doubt as to their nature: they are
representations of the four Faculties (rheology, philosophy, jurisprudence and medicine, replaced
here by poetry), subdivisions which were- traditional in the organization of libraries' (70).
3. See E.H. Gombrich, 'Raphael's Stanza della Segnmum and the Nature of its Symbolism' in Symbolic
1mages, London 1972, 85-10 I.
4. V. Golzio, &ffaellollei documenti, lIelle teuimonianec dei coruemporanei e nella letterarura artiuica del
suo sccuio, Rome 1936, 203.
5. For the older literature see Dussler, Raphael, 69-79; H. von Einem, Das Programm der Stanza della
Sfgnatl/ra im Vatikan, Opladen 1971; J. Shearman, 'The Vatican Stanze: Functions and Decoranons',
Proceedings oftbe Britisch Academy in Rome 57 (1971) 3- 58; H. Pfciffer, Zur 1konogmphie von Raffiuls
Disputa. Egidio da Vitubo und die chrisrlich"platoni,che Konzeptiorl da Stanza della Segnatura (Miscel-
lanea Historiac Pomif'iciae 37) Rome 1975; J. Wood, 'Cannibalized Prints and Early Art History.
264 HISTORYOJ' COt\CEI'TS
Vasan, Bellori and Frcarr de Chambray on Raphael", [oumai ofthe Warburg and Courftluld Institutes
51 (1988) 210-220.
6. H.B. Gutman, 'Medieval content of Raphael's "School of Arhons'", journal ofthe History ofIdem 2
(I 941) 420-429 and 'Zur Ikonologie dcr Preskcn Raffaels in der Stanza della Segnarura', Zeirschrift
flir Kumtgeschichte 21 (1958) 29-39; CG, Srndbeck, Raphael Studies. A Puzzling Pmsage in Vasaris
"Vite': Stockholm 1960; M. Winner, '11 giudizio di Vasari sul!e prime rre Sranze di Raffaello in
Varicano', in Raffielto in Vatieano, Catalogue Rome 1984, who is more positive about Vasari rhan
usual. but does nOI accept Vasan's identification of the Evangelists and his chronology, see especially
186-] 87. 1 published some of the ideas elaborated in this article in B. Kempers, 'Sraarssymboliek in
Raffaels Stanza della Segnarura', [ncontri, 2 (l986/87) 3-48, 'Antiek fundament voor een christelijk
monument: rheologischhumanisme in Rafael's "School van Arhene", in H. van Dijk and E.R. Smits
(eds.), Dwergen op schouderv van Reueen. Srudies over de recepeie van de Oudheid in de Middeleeuwen,
Groningen 1990, 83-107 and Paintillg, Power and Patro'Mge. The Rise ofthe Profmional Artist ill Ren-
aissance Italy, London 1992, 244-259. For a recent overview and a detailed iconographic analysis see
in particular Winner, 'Il Giudizio di Vasari' and 'Progetti e esecuzione nella Stanza della Segnarura',
&ffielto nelt'Appartemento di Gndio J[ e Leone X, Milan 1993, 247-291.
7. [. Burckhardt, Die Cuitur der Renaissancein ltalien, Base! 1860. Burckaardr's statement on Raphaei is
remarkable because it is dose to what johan Huizinga wrote about jan van Eyck. In this way,
Huizinga aspired both to emulate Burckhardt, and [Q criticize him at the same time. For both authors
see F. Haskell, Hi,tory and its Images. Art and the Interpretation ofthe Past, London 1993, 331-345,
350-351 and 433-495.
8. The denial of revelation as a source of rrurh is, for instance, expressed by J.G. Fichte, Verl"Uch einer
Critik alier Offinbarung, 1793; Karu was a major philosopher to stress Vernunfi as the source of wis-
dorn; in Francc Dideror and d'Alembert contributed to this shift in emphasis. At a later stagc ethics
was given a place ofirs own. For changes in disciplinary classifications, see E. Zilsel, The Genesis of
the Concept of Scientific Progtcss', journal ofthe History ofIdem 6 (1945) 325-349; E.]. Dijksrerhuis,
De mechani>ering van het werddbeeld, Amsterdam 1950; P.G. Krisreller, The Modem System of the
Arts. A Study in the History of Aesthetics', journal ofthe of 12 (I 95 I) 496-527; and R.
Darnron, The Great Cat M,wacre and other in French History, New York 1984, 191-214
[T'hilosophers Trim the Tree of Knowledge').
9_ A. Comte, Cmm de philorophiepositive. 6 vols. Paris 1838, second edition 1864. He constructed three
srages: hat thiologique (subdivided in the age of polytheisme and monatbeismes, hat metaphysique and
the 5(;l.ge of the sciences positives which Comre considered philosophical and positivist or scientific.
See alsoJ- Heilbton, Het ontstaan van de wciologie, Amstetdam 1990, 207, 217 and 246-252.
10. See Hdlbron, Het ontsta,m van de Sociologie, 63-4, 70-4, 103 and 115-124.
11. See Th. S. Kuhn, The Structure o/Scientific Revolutions, Chicago/London 1970.
] 2. I omir the vase lircrarure on Academies, see for instance Zilsel, 'Genesis', journal ofthe History ofIdeas
(1945) 341l.
13. Idie de laperftctio1l de lapeinture by, as the tide page states ROLAND FREART SJEVR DE CHAMBRAY, is re-
published, with an inrroducrion by A. F. Blunt, Farnborough 1968.
14. See also G. Vasari. Viu de'piii eccellenti pinori; archirettori esculiori, ed. G. Milanesi, 9 vols. Florence
18781885; on Raimondi, VI 490, and below.
15. On page 104 he states 'le ne veux pas m'amuser icy dauanrage 11 fairevne glose continue iusqu'a la fin
de cerre longue et tree-importune rapsodie de Vasari..', but on 115 he still is falsifying 'nostre
Historiell picroresquc Vasari, qui, sans discrerion et sans esprit, et contre route apparence d'aucune
possibilite, a rcllemenr confondu l'ordre des temps er des choses ...'. However Peean notes on ] 16 the
risk 'de me rendre trop ennuyeux dans ma critique, et de m' ennuyer aussi moymesme iJ. vnc lecture si
rapsodieuse. '
16. Forgetting for a moment the rules of proper decorum he tried to discredit Vasari using words like
'fanrasriqucr', 'ignorance' (93), 'ses ridicules admirarions', 'espece de disgrace 11 Raphael', 'exaggera-
lions exrrauaganres', '['exrrauagancc de son Idee (100), 'sones louanges' (I 02), 'impertinens [lareurs',
NOTES 265
'vision fantastique', 'ridicule admiration', Tapplication chymerique' (liS) and 'ces resueries qui sonr
vn vray labyrinte, d' OU il est extrememenr difficile de sonir' (lO6).
17. Freart, Idle de la perjf:crion, 1078. Cf in opposition Wood, 'Cannibalized Prints', Journal ofthe War-
burg and Courtauld Institutes (1988) 218-9, concluding that Frcart is correct in his criticism of Vasari.
18. See, among others, Blunt in his introduction to Prean, Idie de la perfection de lapcintere.
19. G.P. Bellori, Dncrizzione detle imagini dtpinte da Rajj'lelto d'Uroino nette Gamere del Palazw
ApossoiicaVaticano, Rome 1695.
20. Bellori, Dcscrizsionr dette imagine dipinte, 4-G. lr is worrh mentioning that Bellori quotes the last
word of GiuSfizia's inscription as tribuens, not tribuit, which would correspond to Justinian's state-
men! more c1osdy; as the inscriprions were very difficult to read in the eighteenth century small mis-
takes during restoration work are not to be excluded. The variant tribuens would change my argu-
ment a little, see below.
21. For this engraving of 1523 see also Wood, 'Cannibalized Prints', Journal of rhe Warburg and
Courtauld Institutes (1988) 215-21 G, with additional references. On this engraving, the book and the
tablet have Greek texts, alluding to the Gospel of Saint Luke.
22. Bdlori, Drscriazione delle imagini dipinte, 15-17.
23. See also Winner, 'IJgiudizio di Vasari'. Raffael/o, 180182- These drawings, among them the left and
right-hand group of the 'Dhputa: belong to his 'ricordi e scrini fani infin da giovanerro'. For Vasari's
iconographic analysis it is important to note that during his first visit he was very young, and may
have made small mistakes. Yet as a painter, it is unlikely that he completely confused the two frescoes.
24. Vasan, Vite, VU 13.
25. See also Wood, 'Cannibalized Prints', Journal ofthe Warburg and Courtauld ImriwTes (1988) 21 1.
2G. This section does not refer to all the material that I need, and only gives an oudine for a new hypoth-
esis which will be published separately. The function of the Stanza della Segnarura has been the sub-
ject of much debate. Shearman's hyprhesis that it housed julius' new bibliotheca secretahas been gen-
erally accepted. Von Einem in his Programm der StanZil does not accept this function. See Shear man,
'Vatican Starue' with most of the older literature, and CcL. Frommel '11 Palazzo Vaticano sotto Giulio
11 c Leone X. Strunura e funzione' in rhe catalogue Raffiello in Vaticano (1984) 118-135. Unfortu-
nately there are no handbooks, leners or diaries from that period informing us on the etiquette in the
semi-public part of the papal palace. For some later parallels, see P. Waddy, Sevellttemh-Century Ro-
man Palaces. Useand the Art ofrhe Plan, New York 1990, 3-13.
27. Parmcnio, presentation copy 10 julius in Biblioreca Aposrolica Varicana Vat. [at. 3702-
28. P.O. Krisreller, Studies in Rmansance Thought and Letters 11, Rome 1985, 68, 171.
29. See also Shearman, 'Vatican Sranze', notes 88 and 89.
30, See for instance Von Einem, Programm der Stanza della Segnatura, 20-22 and also Pfeiffer Raffids
i ~ p u t a 153-170.
31. This translation might suggest a way of causal thinking in the context of modern science; it is impor-
tant to stress that the domain of knowledge in the context of Raphael's 'School of Athens' is not re-
stricted to natural philosophy.
32. In particular Lucrctiu.', De rerum natura I 62-79, where humana ViM is linked to religion and the
realm of heaven, III 1072 (' ...quam bene si vidcar, iam rebus quisque relicti, naruram primum
srudcar cognoseere rerum... '), a passage in which the study of the nature of things is not restricted to
the natural sciences, V 1161-1163 ('Nunc quae causa deurn per magna numina gemis pervulgarit et
ararum compleverir urbis suscipiendaque curarir sclemnia sacra... ') and V 1185 (' ... nee pOleram
quibus id fierer cognoscere causis'), discovering by which causes all that came about refers to the array
of heaven, and includes divinity, religion and ritual.
33. Most notably in his Metaphysica, known in Rome mainly rhrough its Latin translations, Aristotle
coined the concept rheologia as one of three branches of theoretical philosophy, the other tWO are
mathematics and physics, see Metaphysim 102Ga, 'Immobilia vera omnes quidem cause sempiteme er
maxime ee; hee narnque cause manifesris divine sunt. Quare rres erunr philosophic rhcoricc:
mathematica, physica, rheologia (non enim rnanifcsrum quia si alicubi divinum exisrit, in tali natura
266 HIS'j(JRY OFCONCEl'n
exisut)': repeated in 1064b, 3, in some editions. See Ar;,totc!el Latinus XXV 2 Metaphysi{a. Translar!o
anonyma sive 'media', ed. G. Vuillemin-Diem, Leiden 1976. This provides another argument against
rhe identification of causarum (ognitio with philosophy distincr in all respects being from theology.
Such a conceplUalizarion would have been alien to Plato and Aristotle who were studied with an ever
increasing philologic arrcruion. From late Amiquiry to the High Renaissance the science of things di-
vine or sacred science was considered to be the queen of all sciences. In early Greek usage the word
referred ro rhe content of myths. Augustine continues to consider philosophy and theology as to a
large extent overlapping fields of interest, and Thomas Aquinas stresses their close connection. A
cleat CUt distinction between philosophy and theology as specialized disciplines is foreign to the pre-
Protestant Christian Nec-Plaronisrn in Rome at the age of julius 11.
34. For Bonaventura see Gutman, 'Medieval content', journal ofthe History ofIdeas (1941) 425, 428, and
'Zur Ikonologie': 1 think that Gurman overstates his thesis about the overwhelming influence of
Bonavenrura: his analysis of the inscriptions, 29. See also Pfeiffer RaffiuIJ Di,puta, 153-170, who re-
fers to Thomas Aquinas as well. With Dante, Petrarch and others, they added meaning to classical
and biblical concepts. For that reason they are pcrtayed, but none of them is thf source of the picto-
rial programme.
35. lnmtutiones 1 1 which opens with De iustitia et iure. its first sentence being 'Iusriria est consrans er
perpetua voluntas ius suum cuiquc rribuens. I. Iuns prudenria est divinarum atque humanarurn re-
rum noritia, iusri arque injusti sciemia'. The meaning of this is clarified in section 3: 'Juris praecepta
sunr haec: honesre vivere, alrerurn non laedere, suum cuique tribuere', which is linked to two kinds of
study: public law and private law, which consists of ius naturale. ius gmtium and im cioile. See also
Digpftl 1.1.10, where the iuris prdfapla ate defined before iuris prudmtia, while in 1.1 slightly differ-
ent formulations are given.
36. Ciccro, De finibl<S bonorum et ma!o/"Um, V XXIII 65; Cicero links institia to other virtues, such as
[ortitudo, temperantia and prudrntia (67), repeating the definition in other words ' .. .iusritia in suo
cuique tribuendo'. See also De officii, I, which in turn, has close parallels to Plato's Rfpublica and his
Protagorm where classifications of virtues are discussed. Cicero connects imtitia, the first of four as
pects of honestas or the honcstum. to temperantia (or mOdfratio, or modesria), flrtitudo and pruderuia,
that implies knowing the past and the future (or cognitio, or scicntia. or sapienzia, or ratio). See also
the influential definitions in Df inventions I1 160-162, of prudmtia, pmvidmtia, rdigio, piaa" cultus
ius IfX, [ortitudo. trmperantia and related abstra<:tions, in particular: "lustiria est habitus animi com-
muni utilitare conservata suum cuique rribuens riignitarern', Cicero's concepts, subsequently
chrisnanued, are relevant for the female personificauons on the so-called 'Jurisprudence wall', yer
neither De officiis, nor De finibus provides a clear cm fourfold classification rhae fits the
personificanous petfectly. Ambrosius coined the concept of four uirnuei cardinales - temperantia,
flrritudo, sapicntia and iustitia, on which the others depend. This conceprualizarion was further
elaborated by Thomas Aquinas. Augustus personified iwritia,llirtus, pietdS and demmtia which were
depicted on hi, c!UPfUS aurfm- golden shield.
37. See Dign(a 1.1.1, 1. 1.2, 1.7.45 (on divine and human law, the first concerning m sacrae et rdigiosad
and 1.8.6-10; knowledge of both the divine and the human is rime and again declared to be crucial
fur justice, the law and its science. In an interpolation of Justinian (fmtlrurionfs 1.2.11), it is said that
a divine providence always remains firm and immovable. Df conceprione digmorum stresses God's au-
thority, heavenly majesty and the Trinity as crucial to the world order; hence laws, constitutions and
Justice imply res dioinae et humanae; and the study of both. With regard to the issue of identifica-
tions, I think the ruler to the left is more likely to be Caesar Augustus (Pnnup" Consul; PaterPatriae
and Pontifix Maximu,) than Justinian who was not a major figure in the writings of juiius' advisers.
38. Cicero, De legibus I, VIII 24, where he stated that only man has any knowledge of God: 'iraque ex tot
generibus nullum est animal praeter hominem, quod habear noritiam aliquam dei'.
39. Terrullian and Augustine discuss flatu, and related words and assigned them a Christian meaning. In
a discussion of the Delphic oracles, Cicero used afflatus or adf/arus, by the divine, as a means to fore-
see the future, see Dfdivinatione Il, LVll117. See also divino ajflatusfor the Pyrhian priestess (I, XIX
Non) 267
38) and the same for the Eryrhraean sibyl (I, XVlll 34). Discussing great men he stated ' ... sine aliquo
afflatu divino umquam foie, sec Dt' natum tUOffim 11, LXVI 167. Both Virgil and Cicero have been
Christianized in rhe verbal and pictorial ccnrexr of rhc Stanza della Segnatura. Cicero also used
nummwith some frequency as well as harmonia. For example, Republica I 16 and 11 69, have a mean-
ing rhar is relevant for the 'School of Athens' and the Stanza as a whole.
40. See J. O'Malley, Rome mid the Rml1i"anu. Studies in Culture and Re/ipon, London 1981 (V) 292,
'sibyllae ducenris scienria prius, deinde numinis afflanns sapientia institui nos 0p0rlere significavit.'
41. Sec for example, L.L.E. Schiurcr, alleen. Em plaatsbepaling van tuin en
hui, in het Convivium religiosum van Emsmus, Amstenlam 1995,
42. If Bdlori's rranscriprion as 'rribuens' is correCI, the happy few would have to meditate on similar
things, yet in a somewhat simpler way: "knowledge of causes is inspired by divinity due to insight in
the divinity, the law giving everyone his due".
43. Such as the magic square (SATORlAREPO/TENET/ol'ERA/RUlilS). Augustine's reading of the prophecies of
the ErYlhraean Sibyl (the inirialleners of the verses formed 'Jesu5 Chtist, Ihe Son of God, the Sav-
iour', De civitate Dei XVII, XVlllj and the inscriptions of the sibyls in Ihe Sasscni Chapel in Santa
Trinita at Florence.
44. The female personification is usually identified as Astronomy or the Arisrorelian Primo Moto;
primum mooens or caU$a (with or withoul a spccificanon) seems more correct to me.
45. Sec, among other publications, Kristeller, Studies in Renaissance Thought, further references on 586.
46. Sec in particular J. d'Amico, Humanism in Papal Rome: Humanists and Churchmen on the Eve o/the
Reformation, Baltimore 1983 and O'Malley Rome and the Renaissance: also Cile, on Church
and Refirm. A Study in Renaissance Thought, Leiden 1968 and Praise and Blame in Renaissance Rome,
Rhetoric, Doctinr and Refirm in the Sacred Orators ofthe Papa! Court, ea. 1450-!521, Durham 1979.
Their work is integrated in the view of Ch. S. Stinger, The Renaissan.ce in Rome, BloominglOn 1985,
however wiIh the exception of Raphael's iconography in the S[ama della Segnatura, 196-202. The
trend in thinking may be coined theological. Biblical or Roman humanism, though none of these
terms isentirely satisfactory.
47. There are remarkable, and 1 think convincing, parallels wirh earlier images, for ins[anee medieval
manuscripls, panel paimings (Francesco Traini, 'Triumph of Saint Thomas Aquinas', Santa Carerina
in Pisa and Benozzo Cozzoli's 'Triumph ofThomas Aquinas' in the Louvre), frescoes (Carsfa Chapel
in Rome), mosaics and sculpture (the floor of Siena Cathedral shows Socrates, its facade Plato, Aris-
totle and the Evangelists). Their joint appearance, with Paul as well, is by no means exceptional. An
interesting parallel is also the medal with on the rectoa portrait of Cardinal Domenico Grimani, a
friend ofJulius 11, and on the verso two personifications. To the left stands THEOLOl.;IA, stretching her
left hand 1O the righe one of PI-lILOSOPHIA, who is sitting and has a Iowa position, while above [he
hand of God touches the right hand of the woman who personifies theology (National Gallery Wash-
ington, Kress Collection). The frontispiece of G. Reisch, Margarita philosophica, 1503 shows
Philmophia and the seven artes in a way that differs from Raphael, yet unites Aristotle and Seneca
wirh the four Church Fathers in the margin. There was a dominant iconographic tradition, connect-
ing the classical and biblical world.
48. Some of these identification, have been ptop(}$ed in Kempers, 'Staatssyrnboliek', Inton.tri, 0986/87}
3-48; 'Antiek fundament voor een chrisreiijk monument' in Van Dijk and Smits (eds.}, Dwergen op
schouders van Reuun; and Painting, Power and Patronage, The ofthe Proftssional Artist in Renais-
$ance Italy, London 1992.
49. Known as Libri quattuor ,ententi(/( and In quattuor librO$ sententiarum, Rome 1504, published by Sil-
ver, and Paeius Cortesi, In Sentmtim, Basel 1513, republished in the same town in 1540. See
d'Amico, Humanism in Papal Rome, 148-168. The Paris edition by Badius (1513) contains the text
Pauli Cortesii Protonotarii: ..In quattuor libros sememisrum argurae romanoque etoquio di,putationn
The text was in the eighteenth century included in Conesi's Opera Omnia.
50. Biblioteca Aposrolica Vacicana Vac lar. 1125; its miniatures contain references to julius Ceasar and
AugustuS, as Ihose in J.M. Vat. Lac 1682 fol. 8v-9r. The primed edition ofVigerio was
268 HISTORY 01' CO:--JCEI'TS
published in Fano 1507 and Paris 151? by both Badius and Koberger, together with the Controversia
de excdientia Domimcae Passionis, its editioprinceps being Silver in Rome 1512.
51. See O'Malley, Romeand the Renaissance, I, Il, Ill, IV and V.
52. Biblioreca Apostolica Varicana Vat. lar. 6325. See O'Malley, Gilej ofViterbo, and Pfeiffer, Raffaels
Disputa, who links the work of Giles ofViterbo to Raphael's iconography, and might have met more
criticism than he deserved. Cr. Pfeifferin Ra./fiullo aRoma 1986, 50- 51, and, in particular, Pfeiffer,
Ra./filels Dispute. 173-206, drawing close parallels between Egidio's phrases and Raphael's inscrip-
tions.
53. Biblioteca Angelica 502.
54. Volume dedicated to Julius 11, adorned with his coat-of-arms and other insignia in BibIiote<:a
Apostolica Vancana
55. Adriano Casrellesi, De vera philosophitf ex quattuor doctoribus ecdesiae, Bologna 1507 - published by
A. de Benedictis and in 1514 by Mazochi in Rome - has a similar orientation on the Latin DO<;lors of
the Church, bur is more critical about the merits of pagan philosophy and the roleof human reason.
This cardinal, who was not a favourite ofJuIius 11, rcrumcd 10 a defence of faith, but in a Ciceronian
style; rhe liberal arts muse be judged by their agreement with divine revelation. See d'Arnico Human-
ism in PapalRome, 169-188.
56. Similar views were also presented in Prance, for example in the publications of jacqucs Lefevre
d'Eraplcs. He published on logic, mathematics, Aristotle, Saint Paul, the Gospels and other parts of
the Bible. His aim was to provide accurate and elegant translations on the basis of reliable texts; he
wanted to ptesent Aristotle's natural philosophy in accordance with Christian doctrine. More critical,
especially in his later works, was Guillaume Bude. He prepared an edition of the Corpus iuris civilisin
1508, when his Annottltiones in Pandertas were published (Paris Badius 1508). In his annotations and
commentary to the firsc twentyfour books of the Digesta, Bude quotes the Ciceronian definition of
philosophy from De oratore Liber I: to know all things, human and divine, and link> this to Ulpian's
definition of jurisprudence which is likewise a quest for all embracing knowledge. Bude criticizes
Accursius and prefers to refer directly to the classical tradition to provide a harmony among all scho-
larly pursuits and its practical adaptations. For this synthesis he likes to use conCeptSsuch as encyclo-
pedia and philorheoria. His commentary on the Justinian definition ofJustice (24) contains references
to Cicero, Plato, Aristotle, Lactantius and Augustine, and to painted images of iustitia. A Paris edi-
lion (J. Petit 1508) of sections from the COrpU$ depicts an empetor in front of three bishops and four
princes - alluding to rhe German Emperor - as well as the text 'AV(;V51"VS'. This image occurs in sev-
eral French editions nf Justinian's Corpus. This imagery is another argument against identifying the
ruler to thc viewer's left on the 'jnrisprudance wall' as Justinian, who is given much less emphasis in
contemporary ideas in Rome than Augustus, the legitimate founder of both imperial and papal au-
thority. Anemprs to provide a synthesis between Greek knowledge and Christian faith become a mat-
ter of debate in the 1520s and I 530s, witness Etasmus, Dialogvs wi titvlvi Ciceronianv, iiue de optimo
dicendi genere (Basel 1528, published by Froben) and Bude, De transitu Hellenismi ad Chris
tianismum, Paris 1535. This work dealt, again, with the relation between the pagan and the Christian
that developed from Hellenist culture, but acquired ideas, concepts and a history of its own. Philoso-
phy should aim at [ognitio Dei, but Hellenism on its own runs the risk of misunderstanding the
truth, and would bring only philomoriaeor pseudo$ophiae.
CHAPTER 11
1. E. de Jongh, 'Seventeenth-century Dutch painting: multi-faceted research', in N.C.E van Sasand E.
Wine (ed.), Historicalresearch in the Low Countries, Den Haag 1992, 35-46.
2. J.N. van Wessem, '[an Sreen (16261679), Her ocstereetstertje', OpenbaarKUllitbezit 1 (1957) 7a-7b;
'WiJ moeten wel bedenken dar een schtldersruk als kunstwerk nooit beJangrijk is om her war, maar
alleen orn het hoe'.
Nons 269
3. 'Men moet de Schildenjen niet oordeden na de beeltenisscn [figuren] die daar in scacn/ man na de
konst in de selviger en na de aardige beduidingen'.
4. Sverlana Alpers, The art ofdauibing. Dutch art in the sev(nteemh femury, Chicago 1983.
5. Alpers, ldem, 103-109.
6. Cf. Peter Hechr, De Holland" fijmchildm, Rijksmuscllm Amsterdam 1989; Jan-Baptist Bedaux, Th(
r(ality ofsymbols. in the iconology ofNeth(rfandi,h art /400-/800, The Hague 1990; Eric-jan
Sluijter, 'Didactic and disguised meaning? Several seventeenth-century texts on painting and rhe
konological approach to Northern Dutch paintings of this period', in David Freedberg & Jan de
Vnes (ed.), Art in history; in art. in seventeenth-century rsdture, Santa Monica Ca. 1991,
175-207.
7. Sluijter, Id(m, 184-187.
8. Cf. Lyckle de Vries, Wybrand de Geeu, 'De Friessche Adelaar', Portraschilder ill Leescu/ardm
/592-c./66J, Leeuwarden 1982, 20-2.3. Portraits were discussed at length only by Cerard Lairesse in
Het groot srhitderhoek 11, Amsterdam 1707, 5-42.
9. Cf. E. de Jongh, 'Die 'Sprachlichkeir' der niederlandischen Malerei im 17. Jahrhunden', in Sabine
Schulze (cd.), Lesdust, Nicdertdndische Ma/(r(i lion kcmbrandr bis Vermeer, Schirn Kunsrhalle
frankfon 1993, 23-33.
10. S. F. Wjtstein, 'Aandaclu voor de Aenleidingc' in Tijthchrift eoor Nrderiandsc raal- en letteriamde 88
(972) 81-10G; E.K. Groores, 'Vondels Aenleidinge rer Nederduitsche dichrkunstc (1650)' in
wrerwerk. OpueL/en aangebodm aan prof dr Garmt Stuiveling tcr gelegenheid van zijn aficheid als
hoogLeraar aan de Uniuersiteit van Amsterdam, Assen 1973, 81-95 en 253-258. Croorcs points Out
that Vondel has left various aspects aside. Cr. J. van den Yondel, AenLeidinge ter Nedcrduiesche
di,'htkunste, Utrecht 1977.
11. Ccsarc Ripa, kon%gia, ofuytbeeUingen IJeutanth... , translated by D.T'. Pers, Amsterdam 1644. A
reprint of 1971 includes an interesting introduction by jochen Becker, Utrecht 1971.
12. The idea that many seventeenth century paintings are multivalent on purpose has been advocatedby
[an Bialosrocki, The mwage afimages. Swdies in the history ofart, Vienna 1988, 166" 180; and jochen
Becker, 'Dcr Blick auf den Herrachrer: Mehrdeutigkeir als Geslaltungsprinzip niederlandischer Kunst
des 17. [ahrhunden' in L'arl et les revolutions, Section 7, XXVlIe Congres Internarionale de l'Histoire
de l'art, Straszburg 1992, 77-92.
13. Cat. Vmneer, National Gallery of Art, Washington and Maurirshuis, The Hague
1995-1996,196-199.
14. Ono Vacnius, Amorl/m cmblcmata, Antwerpen 1608, 2-3.
15. E. de Jongh, Kwestie, vall betekenis, Thema en motiefin de Nederlnndse "hilderkunH van de zeuentiendr
eeuw, Leiden 1995, 91,130,240,242 and 277 note 42.
16. Secfootnotes 40 and 46.
17. Cf Jean H. Hagstrum. The sister arts. The tradition o/literary pictorialhm and English poetry from
Dryden to Gray, Chicago etc. 1974.
18. Cf. Maria A. Schenkeveld, Dutch literature in the age of Rembrandr. Theme, and ideas, Amsterdam
1991,115-135.
19. Hagstrum, The Sister Arts, and Oxftrd English Dictionary'.
20. De jongh, Kioeuin van betekenis, 185.
21. JOOSt van den Vondel, Het Pa,cha (1612), in De waken I, Amstcrdam 1927, 164 (een levende
schoon-verwighe schildcnjc').
22. Idem, .Ioseph in Dorhan (1640) in De werken IV, Amsterdam 1930, 74 (,gelijck wy in 'r sluitcn van dir
werck. ten naesten by, mer woordcn dcs ,childers verwen, teickeniagen, en hartsroghrcn, pooghden
na re volgen'). Cf. Schenkeveld, Duuh Literature, 120-121.
23. joost van den Vondel. De waken IV. 590 ('Hy is gewoon zijn Poezyr'Ie huwen aan uw schildery').
24. F. de Quevedo y Villegas, Seven wonderhjl'ke ghe,ichten. In weLcke alle de gebreken deer uuwe, ender
alle statcn IJan menschen, vamaerk/ijck en oock ,tichtelijck, uerden bestraft; ende a/s in an schilderye
270 HlS'rORY CONCEPTS
naeckte!ijck vcrtoom ... , Leeuwarden 1641; LR. Pol, Romanbnehouwing in voorredes. Een onderzaee
naar her denken over de roman in Nederland tmsen 1600 en /755, Utrecht 1987, 24.
25. Horatius, De a,te poetica, vs. 333"-334. Cr. De jongh, Kumtiesvan betekeni$, 100, 258, note 35.
26, RensselaerW. Lee, Ut pietura poesis. The humanistic theory ofpainting, New York1967, 3-9.
27. Ibidem 3; Hagstrum, The Sister Art$, 10,29.
28. Cr. Allan Ellenius, De arts pingendi. Latin art literature in seventeenth.century Sweden and its interna-
tiona! background. Uppsaia, 1960,72-96. K. Porteman, 'Geschreven met de [inkerhand? Leneren
tegenover schilderkunsr in de Couden Eeuw', in Marijke Spies [ed.), Histonsche kuerkunde, Facctren
van vakbeoeftning, Groningen 1984, 93-113 esp. 106.
29. Sir Joshua Reynolds, Discourses on art, edited by Robert R. Wark, New Haven 1975, 130.
30. Cr. Peter Hecht, 'The paragone debate: ten illustrations and a comment', Simiolus 14 (1984)
125-136.
31. lrma A. Richter, Paragone. A comparison ofthe arts by Leonardo da Vinci, London 1949.
32, Philips Angel, Lofderschilder-konst, Leiden 1642,27.
33. Porteman. 'Ceschrcvcn met de linkerhand?', Spies (ed.), Historische lmerkunde; also Porteman,
Inleiding tot de Nederlandse emblematalitcratuur; Groningen 1977.
34. J.A. Emmens, 'Apelles en Apollo. Nederlandse gedichren op schilderijen in de 17de eeuw',
Kumthistorische opstellenI, Amsterdam 1981, 5-60.
35. Roger H. Marijnissen, Bruegd Het volledig oeuvre, Anrwcrpen 1988, 133-144. See also Mark
Meadow, 'On the structure of knowledge in Bruegel's Nerberlandlsh proverbs', Volkskundig Bulletin
18 (1992) 141-169.
36. Seecatalogue exhibition Le sihle de Rembrandt. Tableaux holtandais des collectionspubliques franfalSeS,
Musee du Petit Palais, Paris 1970-1971, 45-46.
37. er. Gerdien Wuestman discussing an etching from 1606 wirh rhe same theme, after David
Viockboons by Hcssel Gerritsz (?), in Ger Luijren et al. (ed.), Dawn of the Golden Age. Northern
Netht:r/andi,h art 1580 - 1620, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam J993-1994, 614-61 5.
38. See Longrnan's Dictionary ofEnglish Idioms, s.v, 'Possession'. Wuestman, in Luijten et al. (ed.), Dawn
ofthe Golden Age, givesa somewhat different explanation of this proverb on the etching attributed to
Hessel Gerrhsz,
39. Waiter L Srraussand Marjon van der Meulen, The Rembrandt Documents, New York1979, 387 ('Een
piroor nae'r leven, van Rembranr'}.
40. De Jongh, Kwe,ties van betekenil, 248, note 54. Gary Schwarrz, Rembrandt, zijn leoen, zl)n
Khilderijen, Maarssen 1984, 206; H. Perry Chapman, Rembralldt's Self-portraits. A study in
seventeenth-century identity, Princeron NJ 1990, 48. er. Lyckle de Vnes, "Ironies and other single fig-
ured Necherlandish paintings'g in H. Blasse-Hegeman et al.tcd.), Nederlanme portrerten. Bijdragen
over de portretkumt in de Nederianden uit de zestiende, zeventiende en achuiende emw, Lelm
Kumthistorischfaarboek8 {I989), Den Haag 1990, 185202; and E. de Jongh, 'De mate van ikheid
in Rembrandts zelfporcrenen', Kumtschrifi 35 (1992) nr. 6, 13-23.
41. Woordenboek der Nederlandsche Taa! 12 kol. 2027.
42. E. de Jongh, 'jan Sreen, so near and yer so fat', in jan Sreen, painter and storyteller, exhibirion cata-
logue National Gallery of An, Washington, and Rijksmuseum Amsterdam 19961997,45-49
43. Ibidem 48-49
44. See E. de Jongh et aI., Face$ ofthe Golden Age. Seventeenth-Century Dutch Portraits, exhibition cara-
logue The Yamaguchi Prefectural Museum of Art, Yamaguchi 1994, English Supplement, 48-49.
45. Ripa, konologia, ofuytbeeldingen des vmtands, 316-317, 484, 470.
46. Ben Broos, Meesrerwerken ill her Mauritshuis, Den Haag 1987, 185-\89.
47. Alpers, The art ofdescribing, 187.
48. Ben Broos et al., Hollandsc mecsters uit Amerika, exhibition catalogue Maurirshuis, Den Haag
1990-1991,291-294.
49. A difference of opinion exists on how the rext should be transcribed. Seymour Slive, Frans Hals I,
Londen 1970,93, reads 'naers' instead of 'nads': 'Who recognizes my arse from the rear', Also in
NOTES 271
Broos et al., Hollandse musters, 293. er. E. de [ongh, 'Woord en Beeld. De salon van de gezusters
Kunst', KumtKhrift38 (I 994) or. 5,6-12.
50. 'Die mij beschouwd, die wisre graagl En wic ik zij, en war ik dtaag:1 Maar vriend, ik ben als die mij
ziet;l want nogh ken ik mijn zdv<::n nicr.'
51. E. de Jongh et aI., Still-life in the age ofRembrandr, exhibition catalogue Auckland City Art Gallery,
Auckland 1982, 198"203.
52. A catalogue of Sorheby, New YOtk 19 mei 1995, attributed this work to the French artist Simon
Renard de Saint-Andre, who was deeply influenced by Dutch vanira'painters.
53. See Nederianase 17de eeuwse scbiiderijen uit Boedapest; exhibition catalogue Cemraal Museum,
Utrecht 1987, 8485; and De wereld binnrn handbrreik. Nederlandse kumt- en raritdtrnvrrzamdingm,
1585-1735, exhibition catalogue Amsterdams Historisch Museum, Amsterdam 1992, 20.
54. De Jongh et al., Stiff-life in thrage ofRrmhrandt, 192-197.
55. The poem in Brise'spainting runs as follows:
'De door srele hoogh en laagh gelyck/En 'rmiddelbaar en Arm en Ryk.lHet scerven is'r gemeene lot,!
De Boek Geleenheit en Marot/Zyn even schocn en wys in 'r Graf/De Delvers Graaf en Bissopssraf/
De Zackpyp, ende Tulbantskroon/Staan al int uirersr even schoon/Laar woelen al wat woelen will
Soo staat het al ten lesreu sril.'
There are some small differences compared to Vondel's text and orthography; joosr van den vondel,
De werkenIX, Amsterdam 1939, 293.
56. Zie Lydia De Pauw-De Veen, De heqrippen $childer', "chi/daij' en $childeren'in de uventiende reuw,
Brussel 1969, 141-142.
57. See note 55.
CHAPTER 12
1. Earlier versions of this text were delivered in the form of lectures at Sranford and Cornell Universities
in 1990 and 1992, respectively. In this regard I would like to thank Kcirh M. Baker (Sranford) and
Nan E. Karwan Cutting (Cornell), as well their students, for their valuable suggestions, which I
have raken into a<::count as far as possible. Th", present text was rendered into English with the sensi-
tive and comperent assistance of Deborah Cohen, Sabinc Koerner"Bourne and Mkhad Wagnet.
2. For a general overview of this subject, see jeanne Duportai, Etude sur les firms it figures Mite, en France
de 160/ it 1660, Geneva 1992, and Jean-Marc Chatelain, Livres d'emblemes et de devim: une
anthologie, 153/-1735, Paris 1993. The question of whether such allegories were broadly comprehen-
sible or elitist puzzles is discussed in Peter johannes Schneemann, Geschichre ais Vorbild: Die Modeile
derftanzosischen Historienmalerei 1747-1789, Berlin 1993, 66-93; see also Antoine de Baecque. The
Allegorical Image of France, 1750- I800: A Political Crisis of Representation', Representations 47
(I993) 111-43-
3. The publishing house Aux amateurs des Livres ha.'> brought out a selection of reprints: La &curiu
d'emblemes et les traitcs de physiognomie de la Biblioshique interunisertitaire de Liile, 11 vols., Paris
1989.
4. These as well as those in interpr"'tations may be verified by consulting the compre-
hensive rexrs that accompany the emblem books and explain their illustrations; in this connection see
Cesarc Ripa. Iconologie01. la principales {hoses qui peuvent tomber dam lapemle touchant les vice, sont
reprarmees, tram. from the Italian by Jean Baudoin. 2 vols., Pari51643, vol. I 99-101.
5. Ibidem 1 54, SR.
6. Some references in Mauricc Agulhon'5 Marianne au [ombat: L'imagerie et la symbolique rlpublicaine,
de 1789 a 1880, Paris 1979; also I.ynn Hunt, Politics, Culture, and Class in the French Revolution,
Berkeley 1984, 52-86; and Valeric Chansard, 'us tappons du discouts de la symbolique dans les vi-
gnettes revolurionnaires' in Michel Vovelle (ed.), Los Images de la RIIJolutionftanfaisr, Paris 1989,
317-22.
272 HISTORY OF CONC[I'TS
7. More on this in Klaus Herding and Rolf Reichardt, Die Bildpublizimk der Franzii$;,chm Revolution,
Frankfurt 1989, 151-53,
8. Jean Adhemar, 'Lenseignemenr par l'image', Gazette des Beaux-Arts 97 (1981) 53-60, and 98 (1981)
49-60.
9. The best overview of this body ofsources to date - apart from the musical and iconographical aspens
- is Jean Hebrard. 'Les carechisrnes de la premiere Revolution', in Lise Andrib (ed.), Calporter III
Revolution, Montreuill989, 53-73; and idem, 'La Revolution expliquee aux enfants: les carechismes
de l'an H', in Marie-Francoise Levy (ed.), L'Enjant, !4jamitle et !4 Rlvotution fran(ahe, Paris 1989,
171-92 and 46 I -63.
10. La Socilte desJacobim: Recueil de documents pour l'histaire du club des[acobins de Paris, ed. Alphonse
Aulard, 6 Yak, Paris 1889-97, III 263.
11. [acques-Marle Boyer-Brun, Histoire des caricatures de la reoatredes Francois, 2 vols., Patis 1792, I 9-
10.
12, More on the popular use of picrures for didactic purposes during the French Revolution in Herding
and Reichardt, Die Bildpublizistik der Francesischen Revolution, 15-20.
13. This allegory illustrates the chapter 'Cinquieme Erurerien. L:Egalite' by Chemin-Duponres fils,
CAmi desjeunes patriotes, ou Catechisme repubficain dldie euxjeunes Martyrs de laLibertl, Paris 1793-
1794,30-33.
14. For want of more recent work on this topic, Andre Blurn's classic series of essays, 'L'esrampe satirique
et la caricature en France au XVIII' siecle', remains a standard work, in Gazette des Beaux-Arts 52/i
(I910) 379-92, 52/ii (1910) 69-87, 108-20,243-54,275-92, and 52/iii (910) 449-67. Further-
more, a whole series of examples is contained in the Handbuch politisch-soeialer Grundbegriffi in
Frankreich 1680-1820, ed. by RolfReichardt and Hans-Iurgen Lusehrink, 18 issues to date (Munich
1985-95).
15. Fat more details, see Antoine de Baecque, La Caricature reoohaiannaire. Paris 1988; and Herding and
Reichardt, Die Bildpublizi,tik der Pranzosischen Revolution.
16. On rhe significance of this 'pictorial banle' for the conceptual development of class-consciousness,
see Herding and Reichardt, Die Bildpublizistik der Franzasischen Revolution, 103-12.
17. The model fot rhis drawing was a caricature directed against the Jesuit Gabriel Malagrida dating from
1758, BfbliorhcqueNationalc Paris, Dep. des Esr., Coil. Hennin, nr. 8891.
18. This print is interpreted in greater detail by Antoine de Baecquc in 'Iscaricne, gcant aristocrarc ou
I'image-monstre de la Revolution' in Annates Historiques de la Revolution Francaisc64 (1993) 322-32.
19. jean-Louts Desprez' Chimere (l777-84) did in fact provide the pictorial idea but whereas Dcsprcz
portrayed a monster of the African desert, the anonymous revolutionary draughtsman politicised the
image to the extent that it became a vehicle for drastic social criticism.
20. Commentary on a frontispiece rhar portrays the arittocratie as a many-headed dragon in btrmne$ ala
v ~ r t ~ ou Almanach des Arisrocrases (1790) I.
21. Yves-Marie Berce, Croquams et nu-pieds: souleoemerus paysam en france du 16' au 19' sihles, Paris
1974,
22. See, among others, the fundamental methodological critique of the history of concepts by Dieter
Busse, Historische Semantik: Ana6'se emes Programms, Stuttgart 1987.
23. In what follows this term is understood as referring to the particular vocabulary that defines a key
concept within a specific context or series of similar contexts (paradigms), differentiates meaning
(syntagms) and defines by the juxtaposition of opposites (anronyms). For an illusrrarion of this, refer
to the empirical case studies mentioned in the following footnote.
24. Hans-jurgen Lusebrink and Rolf Reichardr, 'La Bastilfe dans J'imaginaire social de la France a la fin
du XVIlI' siecle, 17741799', Revue d'Histoirc Moderm: et Contemporaine 30 (I983) 196-234; R.
Reichardr, 'Der Honnite Homme zwischcn hdfisclier und bUrgerlicher Cesellschafr: Seriell-
begriffsgeschichrlfche Unrersuchungen von Honnhetl-Traktaren des 17. und 18. Jahrhunderrs'
Archiv ftir Kulturgesrhichte69 (1987) 34170.
NOTES 273
25. In this article, the terms 'key concepts' and 'key words' refer 10 words that are especiallyrich in mean-
ing and which have played an outstanding rok in the collective consciousness of, as well as in the
creation of the (pictorial) symbols common to, particular historicallanguage groups. In my under-
standing, a socio-cultural history of concepts should combine the sociological tenets of Bergerl
Luckmann and Lewis, \X'ingenstein's theory of linguistic communication and Foucaulr's approach to
a semantic of historical discourse. On this, see my introduction to the Handbucb poiirisch-soeialcr
Grundbegriffi, vol 1I2, 60-84; Busse in D. Busse, Frirz Hermann, Wolfgang Teubett (eds.),
Historische Semanrik: Begri./fige,chichre und Dhkunge>ehicht(: Methodefragen und Frmchungurgebniw
der historis,hen Scmanrih, Opladen 1994.
26. In Alain R. Girard and Claude Quercl, L'Hiuoire de France raconteepar leJeu de l'aie; Paris 1982,85-
98, the game is reproduced but no critical commentary is provided.
27. Compare for example with Nyon le [eune's Catichisme de la Conuinaion Fran(aiu, Paris 1791, espe-
ciaIly7-10,15-16and26.
28. The following interpretation is based on my annotated reprint of the game but contains a large
number of modification, and additions; see R. Reichardr, Das R(volutioll$spid ion 179/. Em Beispiel
fUr die Medimpolitik und Selb$tdamellung der Francosischen Revolution, Frankfurt 1989.
29. See M. A. Katrirzky, 'Italian Comedians in Renaissance Prints', Print Quarterly 4 (I987) 236-54, es-
pecially 249.
30. On [he following see Henri-Rene d'Allemagne. Le noble Jeu de l'oie en France de 1640 a 1950, Paris
1950, as well as Girard and Quetel. More recently, three articles ofJames A. Leith have rediscovered
the pedagogical and political Iumions of these games: 'Pedagogy through Games: the Jeu de I'Oiedur-
ing the French Revolmion and the Empire' in Proceedings ofthe COlJSortium OnRevolution.ary Europ(
1992 (1993) 166-199; 'La pedagogic a rravcrs les jeux: leJeu de l'Oie pendant la Revolution fran<;aise
et I'Empirc' in josianc Boulad-Ayoub (ed.], Former Un. noulIeau peuple? Poulloir, Educatio/l,
Revolution, Quebec/Paris 1996, 159-186; 'Clio and the Goose: the jcu de l'Oie as Historical Evi-
dence' in Carolyn W. White (ed.), t."ssays in European History, Selecudfrom th( Annual Meeting ofthe
Southern Historical Association, Lanham ! London 1996, Vol. III 225-261.
31. The popular Precis historique de la Revolution franraise by jean-Paul Rabauc Sainr-Enenne (Stras-
bourg, 1791/92), promoted itself on the fly-leaf with the following announcement: 'jeu national a la
pone de tout le monde, er proprt a fain:: connoitre aroutes les classesde lasociete les avantages er les
bienfait.\ de larevolution et de laconstitution. Ce jeu, principalemenr desrine ainstruire les habiranrs
des carnpagrxs- se vend, pat paquets de 20 exemplaires, a raison de 5 livres, et de 6 livres francs de
port.' Incidentally, Rabaur Sainr-Erienne's almanac propagated the same viewof history as our game.
32. More details in Herding and Reichardt, Die BildpubliziHik der Fmnzosiscben Revolution, 20-24; see
also Claudeue Hould, 'La gravure en Revolution' in C. Hould (ed.), L'lmage de la Revolution
fran(lIise, Quebec 1989,63-94.
33. The second print bears the same ride: Jeu de la Revolution Franrai,e, Anonymous, coloured etching,
1791,35 x 50.5 cm, Bibliorheque Nadonale Paris, Dcp. des Estampes, Coil. Hennin, no. 11050.
34. See Fig. 11 as well as the following copies or variants: two identical copies attributed ro M. Smith
Publishers in London (presumably pirated) and Treuttel Publishers in Strasbourg, respecdvely (both
in the Bibliorheque Narionale Paris. Dept. des Esrampes, ColI. de Vinck, nos. 4292 and 4293); a
simplified copy without accompanying text, entitled Poule de Henri IV(Illus. in Girard and Quercl,
92); and a German translarion including all accompanying texts, entitled Narionalspiel, oder das
Huhn Heinrich des VierUII, in den. liJpfgethan im [ahr 1792, coloured etching with primed letters,
printed in Strasbourg by TreuncI, 1792, Musee HislOrique Strasbourg.
35. See the chronological list in Reichardr, Revolutiomspiel, 8-9.
36. Quoted in Marcel Roux et al., Graveurs du dix-huitii:me sii:c/e, 15 vols. to date, Paris 1931 77, II 158.
37. On this point sec Marcel Reinhard, La Ligmdede Henri IV, Paris 1936.
38. C1arence D. Brenner, 'Henri IV on the French Stage in the Eighteenth Century', Publications ofthe
Modern Language Association 46 (1931) 540- 53; Anne Bob, La Lanterne magique de l'histoire: Essni
274 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
sur le thftlrre hisrorique en France de 1750 a1789, Paris 19S2; Michele Roor-Bemsrem, Boulevard
Theatre and Revolurion in Eighreenrh-Century Paris, Oxford 1982.
39. See among others, Louis-Laurcnr Prault, L'Esprit de Henri IV, 011 Anecdotes le, plm inrereuanres, traits
sublimes, reparties ingenieuses, 6-qudque, iatrcs de ce Prince, Amsterdam 1790.
40. See the description in Prauh, 109; on the historical authentkiry of this scene refer to Reinhard, 103.
41. Prault, 74, embellishes Henry's words: 'si Dicu me fait la grace de vivre dix-huit mois ou deux am, je
veux qu'il n'y air pas un Paysan dans mon Royaume qui ne merre le Dimanche une poule dans son
pot.' According to Reinhard, 58-59, the words 'le Dimanche' were not in the original statement but
added posthumously,
42. Charles Colle. La Paniede chasse de Henri 111, Paris 1760/64. Originally banned due to irs irnplicir
criticism of despotism, the play was extremely successful and in autumn 1791 was staged again in
Paris; see also (he review in the newspaper Revolurions de Paris 114 (I 0.-17. Sept. 1791) 493, and 115
(17-24. Sept. ]791) 520"21.
43. See Charles Tillon, Le Laboureur et fa Republique: Michel Chard, depute papan sou, la Revolurion
fran,ai,e, Paris 1983.
44. Paris 1792; in some of the many editions of this almanac everyone of the 12 'enrretiens' on the Con-
stitution is illustrated with an etching showing Pere Cerard in the company of his peasants.
45. Examples include Abbe Arhanase Auger, Catechisme du citoyen franfais, composede lesprir et de la leare
de '" nouvelle Constitution, Paris 1791; Comte de Mirabeau, Casechismc de la Constitution, ii {'usage
de, habiram de la cttmpgane, 1791.
46. See, among others, the anonymous text La Constitution Fmncaise en chansons, ii /'ufage des honnhfJ"
gem, Paris 1792; a, well as Marchant, La Constitution en vaudevilles, Paris 1792. See also Hcrbert
Schneider, The sung constitutions of 1792: An essay on propaganda in the Revolutionary song', in
Makolm Boyd (ed.), Music and the French Revolution, Cambridge 1992,236-75.
47. Book I, Chapter I. ChaprCfs 3 and 4 are enriried 'Du droit du plus fort' and 'De l'esclavage', respec-
tively.
48. By not showing Voltaire himself but rather his mortal temains at the ceremonial panrheonisarion on
11 July 179], rhis miniature - modelled on a contemporary illustrated broadsheet - establishes an-
orher link between the Enlightenment and the Revolution.
49. They are holding the manifesto for Louis XVI with which they protested against the Constitution on
the 10 September 1791: 'Lettre de Monsieur er de M. le comte d'Artois au roi leur frere', printed in
Gazetre national-ou le Monireur no. 266, 23 Sept. 1791.
50. By connecting this Paradise with the Apotheosis of the great Men (field 8]), which stands under the
sign of the Pantheon, the game replaces rhe Christian notion of Resurrection with a secular 'Ascen-
sion' as decreed by Parliament in an act of political canonization.
5J. Playing off Henry IV against Louis XVI in both texts and pictures was a common journalistic ptac-
tice at that time, as the following three prints (among others) testify: anonymous etching without ti-
tie concerning the accession to power, 1775, Bibliorheque Nationale Paris, Cabinet des Estampcs,
ColI. de Vinck, no. 458; the plan of a monument to Henry IV and Louis XVI, coloured aquatint by
Francois janiner after a painting by Charles Varenne, 1790, Bibliorhcque Nationale Paris, Cabinet
des Esrampes, Coll. de Vinck, no. 460; and the cancature VentreSaint Gm ou m Mon jifs? .., anony-
mous, coloured erching, 1792, Bibliorheque Nationak Paris, Cabinet des Esrampes, ColI. de Vinck,
no. 4002; see the illustrations in Reichardt, Rellolutionsspief, 14-16.
52. On the iconography of this symbol, see R. Reichardt, 'Prints: Images of the Bastj]]e', in Roberc
Darnton and Daniel Roche (eds.}, Revolurion in Print; The Press in France 1775-1800, Berkeley 1989,
223-51; Die 'Bastille': Symbolik und Mythos in der Revoluriomgraphik, Maim. 1989.
53. Ibid., as well as Hans-jurgen Lusebrink and Rolf Reichardr, Die 'Bastille': Zur SymbolgeiChichte von
HemchaJt und Preiheit; Frankfurt 1990, 128-35.
54. Ibidem 25-28.
55. Ibidem 123-28.
NOTES 275
56. This result corresponds exactly with the lexical and semantic text analysis of the ami-Bastille pam-
phlets; see Lusebrink and Reichardt, 'La Basrille dans I'imaginaire social', Revue d'Histoire Modeme er
Contemporaine (1983) 19S-214.
57. For the significance of this symbol in the field of Revolutionary graphics, see Rente Neher-
Bernheim, 'Les Tables de la Loi dans l'iconographie de la Revolution' in Mireille Hadas-Lebel and
Evelyne Oliel-Grausz (eds.), Le5 JUlfi et la Revolution franfaise: Histoire et menta!ite" LouvainJParis
1992,29-52.
58. The great significance of this iconography for the political culture of France in the 19th century is
sketched in my article 'Oer Bildcrkampf zwischen Konigrum und Republik' in Franzosische Prase und
Prmdarikaturen 1789-1992, Maim. 1992,80-93.
59. See Luscurink and Reichhardt, Die 'Bmtille', 222-58; R. Reichardr, Die Stiftung von hankreichs
nationalcr Idcnrirat durch die Selbstmystifizierung der Franzosischen Revolution am Beispicl der
Ba,tifle', in Hclmur Berding (ed.), Mythos ulld Nation, Frankfurt 1996.
60. Steven L Kaplan, Adieu 89, Paris 1993, 307, 331, 3.35, 441; Raymonde Monnier and Michel
Vovelle, LesColloque, du Biccmenairr. Paris 1991.
61. In a general sense, the game was predetermined to have an essentially didactic character by virtue of
the fact that it belongs to the genre of educarional games.
62. Herding and Reichan\t, Die Bildpuhlizi5tik der Franzonschrn Revolutioll, 33-50.
63. Lusebrink and Rcichardr, Die Bt/stitIe, 190-202 and 228-58.
CHAPTF.R 13
1. Zie Resolutien van de Harm Swarm van Holland en Westvriesland, 1595, 580.
2. See A.J. Cclderblom, In Holland, Tuin, Gouda 1995; Simon Schama, The Embnrrassmenr ofRiches.
An Interpretation of DUl<"h Culture ill the Golden Age, London 1987, 69-71; E]. Van Wimer, 'De
Hollandse Tuin', Nedcrlands KumthislOri5eh Jaarboek 8 (1957) 29121.
3. See Martin van Celderen, The political thought ofthe Dutch Revolt, 1555-1590, Cambridge] 992; and
Martin van Gelderen (ed.). The Dutch Revolr, Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought,
Cambridge 1993.
4. Michael Ermanh, 'The transformation of herrneneurics: 19th century ancients and 20th century
modems', The Moni5t64 (1981) 177.
5. RoyJ. How,nd, Threeflues ofhermeneutin, Berkely Ca., 1982, 9; cf. Dietrich Bohler. 'Philosophische
hermeneunk und hermeneutischc Mcroodc', in Manfred Fuhrmann, Hans Roben Jauss, Wolfgang
Pannenberg (cds.}, Text und Applikmion, Munchen 1982, 497.
6. David Couzens Hoy, Thl' criticd circle; Literature, hi,tory andphilosophicai hermencucics, Berkely Ca.
1978, 11.
7. Richard Rernstein, Bryond Objectivi,m and Relativism. Science, Hermeneutics. and Praxis, Philadelphia
1983,145.
8. Donald R. Kelley, 'Horizons of lnrellecrual History; Retrospect, Circumspect, Prospect', Journal of
the Hi,tory of Idem (1987) 143. Other recent reflections on these developments include John Toews,
'Ineellccrual Hisrory after the Linguistic Turn: The autonomy of Meaning and the Irreducibility of
Expriencc', American historical Review 92 (1987) 879-907; John H. Zamrnito, 'Are We Being Theo-
retical Yet? The New historicism, the New Philosophy of hiswry, and "Pranicing hiswrians"',jour-
nal ofModern History 65 (1993) 783-S l4.
9. See Reinharr Koselleck and Hans-Georg Gadamer. Hermeneutik und Historik, Siraungsberichre dcr
Heidelberger Akademie (1987) Berichc I, Heidelberg 1987; Melvin Richter, 'Reconstructing the
History of Political Languages; Pocock, Skinner, and the Geschichthche Grundbegrifjl in Hi5tory and
Theory (1990) 445 and Melvin Richter, The History ofPolitical and Social Concept>. A Critical Intro-
duction Oxford 1995,35.
276 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
10. Richter, The History ofPo/itical and Social Concepts, 35.
11. See Reinhart Kosclleck's contribution to this volume, 'Social HistOry and Begri./figeiChichu'. The fol-
lowing notes, however, refer to Koselleck's original text 'Begriffsgeschichte und Sozialgeschichte' in
Reinhan Koselleck, Historische Semantik und Begri./fige,chichte, Stutrgart 1978, 19-36.
12. Ibidem; Reinharr Koselleck, 'Linguistic Change and the history of Events, Journal ofmodern History
61 (1989) 649. For what follows see also Reinhart Koselleck, 'Begriffsgeschichte und
Sozialgcschichre', Ibidem.
13. Page 26 in this volume.
14. Melvin Richter, 'Conceptual History (BegriffigeiChichte) and Political Theory', Political Theory 14
(1986) 610. See also Richter, The Hi>tory ofPolitical and Social Concepts, 10.
15. Koselleck. 'Begriffsgeschkhre und Soaialgeschicbce', in Historische Semantik und BegriffigeiChichtr,
28-30.
16. Gadamer, Truth and Mrthod, New York 1975, 269.
17. See Koselleck, 'Begriffsge5chichte und Sozialgeschichre', In Histarische Semantik und
BrgriffigeJchichu, 29; Richter, Reconsrructing the History ofPolitleaI L,wguages, 41.
18. Quentin Skinner, 'Meaning and the understanding of speech acts', in [amcs Tully (ed.), Meaning 6-
Context. Quentin Skinner and his Critics, Oxford \988, 29.
19. See Qucntin Skinner, 'Motives, intentions and the Interpretation ofTexts', and Qceruin Skinner 'So-
cial meaning' and the explanation of social action' both in Tully, Meaning and Context, where it is ar-
gued that there is a 'sharp line' ro be drawn between the motives of an actor to do action X and the
intentions the authot has in doing act X. Ccnrexrual factors can show the reasons, the motives for
performing act X. They do not, however, unveil the 'point' of act X.
20. Quentin Skinner, 'A Reply ro my Cridcs', in Tully, Meaning and Context, 232.
21. J.G.A. Pocock, 'Introduction: The Hate of the art', in J.G.A. Pocock, Virtlle, commerce and history:
Cambridge 1985, 5.
22. Pocock, Virtllt, Commerce and History, 8.
23. Quentin Skinner, The ftundations ofmodern political thought. Volume I: The Rmai"ana, Cambridge
1978, xiii.
24. Pocock, Virtue, Commerce and History, 28.
25. See Erasmus, Praig ofFolly, Harmondsworrh 1971, 152.
26. Koselleck, Linguistic Change and the History ofEvents 652.
27. Ibidem 653. See Herodorus, History 3.72.
28. Ibidem 655.
29. Ibidem, 652.
30. Page 7.
31. Hans-Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method, New York 1975,426. See also Kosclleck conrributiou to
this volume.
32. Bodeker, 'Practising Begriffsgeschichre', unpublished paper delivered at NIAS (1995) 6.
33. See RolfReichardt, 'Zur Geschtchre polirisch-sozialer Begriffe in Prankreich zwischen Absclurisrnus
und Resrauration. Vorstellung cincs Forschungsvorhabens', ZeitKhriji fir Literaturwissenrc/uifi una
Lzngu15tik47 (1982) 49"74 and Rolf Reicliardr, 'Einleitung' in Rolf Reichardr and Eberhard Schmitt
(eds.) Handbuch politisch-wzialer GTUndbegri./fi in Frankreich 1680"1820, Munchen 1985, 82-5.
34. Bodeker, 'Practising Begriffsgeschichte', 2.
35. Sce james Farr, 'Understanding conceptual change politically' in Terence Ball. [ames Fan, Russell L
Hanson (eds.), Political innovation and conceptual change, Ideas in Context 11, Cambridge 1989, 24-
49 and Tcrcnce Ball's contribution to this volume, 'Conceptual History and the History of Political
Thought'.
36. Ball, 'Conceptual History and the History of Political Thought', in this volume.
37. Ibidem.
38. Skinner, A Reply to my Critic" 283.
NOTES 277
39. See James Parr, Unda,tanding conceptual change politically, 38; and the contributions ofTerence Ball
and lain Hampsher-Monk to this volume.
40. According to Pocock, Virtue, Commerce and History, 9, 'it is a large part of our historian's practice to
learn to read and recognize the diverse idioms of political discourse as they were available in the cul-
ture and at the time he is studying: to identify them as they appear in the linguistic texture of anyone
text and to know what they would ordinarily have enabled that text's author to propound or 'say'.
41. See Skinnet, Meaning and Context, passim.
42. See L. van den Branden, Het streoen naar vnheerfijking, zuilJering en opbouw van het Nederlandi in de
16e uuw, Gent 1956, and for Coornherr Arie-jan Gelderblom, "Nieuwe srof in Neerlandsch'. Een
karaktcrisnek van Coornherrs proza' in H. Bonger, j.R.H. Hoogervorsr, M.E,H.N. Mout, I.
Schoffer, J .J. Woltjer, Dirck Vofckertswon Coornhert. Dwars maar Recht, Zutphen 1989, 98-114,
43. See Ger Luijren, Ariane van Sochrclcn, Reinier Baursen, Womer Kloek, Marnjn Schapelhouman
(eds.I, Dawn of the Golden Age. Northern Nctherlanaish Art, 1580-1620, Arnsrerdarn/Zwolle 1993,
and Ilja M. Veldman, 'Coornhen en de prenrkunsr' in Bonger et. al. (eds.), Dwan maar &cht, 115-
143.
44. See Johan Huizinga, Dutch Civilization in the Seventeenth Century, London 1968; E.H. Kossmann,
'De Nederlandse zevenriende eeuwse-schilderkunsr bij de hisrorici", in Frank Grijzenhout and Henk
van Veen (eds.), De Gouden Eeuw in penpectief Het buld mm de Nederla"die uventiende-eeuwie
schilderkunst in laur tJjd, Hccrlcn 1992, 280-298.
45. See Ad van der Woude, 'The volume and value of paintings in Holland at the time of the Dutch Re-
public', in jan de Vries and David Preedberg (eds.}, Art in History. History in Art: Studies in seven-
teenth-century Dutch culture, Santa Monica Ca, 1991, 285-329.
46. See Eddy de Jongh, 'Realisme en schijnrealisme in de Hollandse schilderkunsr van de zevenriende
eeuw' in Rembrandt en djn tijd, Brussels 1971, 143-194; Eddy de Jongh et. al, Tot fering en vermaak:
betekenissen van HoIlandse generevoorstellingen uit de zeventiende eeuw, Amsterdam 1976; E, de jongh,
'Some notes on intepretation', in Freedberg and De Vrics (eds.) Art in History, 119-136; E, de jongh,
'De iconologische benadering van de zeventicndc-ceuwse Ncdcrlandsc schilderkunsr', in Crfjzcnhour
and Van Veen (eds.), De Gouden Eeuw in penpectief 299-329, rhe essays in E. de Jongh, Kwestie, van
betekems. Thema en motiefin de Nederlandse schilderkumt van de zeocnticnde eeuw, Lcidcn 1995, and
E. de Jongh's contribution to this volume, 'Painted Words in Dutch Art of the Seventeenth Century'.
For an extremely useful collection of the main conrriburions to the debate see Wayne Franirs (ed.},
Looking at Sevmteemh-Cmtury Dutch Art. Realism Reconsidered, Cambridge 1997.
47. De Jongh, 'Painted words', in this volume.
48. Eric J. Sluijrer, 'Didactic and disguised meanings? Several Seventeenth-century texts on painting and
the iconological approach 10 northern Dutch paintings of this period' in Freedberg and De Vries
(eds.), Art in History, 175.
49. Simon Schama, The cmbarassmrnr ofriches:An Interpretation ofDutch culture in the Golden Age, New
York 1987.
50. Sverlana Alpers, The Art ofDeseribing. Dutch Art in the SelJenrunth Century, London 1989, 229.
51. See David Freedberg, 'Science, Commerce, and Art: Neglected topics at the junction of History and
Art History' in Freedberg and De Vrics (eds.]. Art in Hiswry: Hiswry in Art, 377406.
52. Alpers, TheArtofDmribing, 103.
53. See De [ongh in his contribution 'Painted Words in Dutch Art'.
54. For Huizinga's reflections on history see Jc Toilebeek's essay on 'Huizinga: vcrnicuwcr binnen een
culruurtraditie', in De Toga van Fruin. Denken over ge,chiedenif in Nederland sinas 1860, Amsterdam
1990, 197-257, W.E. Krul, Hiuoricus tegen de tijd. Opstellen over Ieven 6- werk van j. Huizinga,
Groningen 1990, and W.E. Krul, 'Huizinga's definine van de geschiedenis', the concluding section in
Krul's new edition of Huiz;nga's main articles on hisroriography, Johan Huizinga, De tdak der
cuItuurgeschiedenis, W.E. Krul ed., Groningen 1995, 241-339.
55. As jo Tollebeek labels Huizingas enterprise. See J. Tollebeek, De Toga van Fruin. 212.
278 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
56. For Huiainga's view on the interrelationship between art and history see in panicular Francis Haskell,
'Hui:dnga and the "Flemish Renaissance" in Francis Haskdl, HiJtory and its Imagt". Art and the Inter-
prt:tation ofthe Pmt, New Haven 1993, 431-495; Bram e m p e r ~ 'De verle;ding van bet beeld. Het
visuelc als blijvende bron in het werk van Huizinga', Tijdschrifi ioor &eschiedenis, 106 (1993) 515"
534; Frank van Vree, 'Beeid en verhaal - de historicus als kunsrenaar' in P.W.M. de Meijcr c.a.,
Verhaa! en relaas; Muiderberg 1988, 19-35; cd. note 54,
57. Johan Huizinga, 'Het cstherischc besranddeel van geschiedkundige voorsrellingen' in Huizinga, Dt"
taak der cultuurgeschiedenis, 27.
58, See Haskell, Hi$tory and its Images, 488: 'what turns his [Huninga's] achievement into a landmark in
historical method is the explicitness with which he raises fundamental questions concerning the va-
lidiry of his approach'.
59. As quoted in Haskell, Historyand Its Images, 490.
GO. Frcedberg, Science, Commerce and Art, 414-5.
G1. ER. Ankersrnir, 'Statement" Text, and Pictures in Frank Ankersrnir and Hans Kellner (eds.), A new
PhilosophyofHi5tory, London 1995,219.
G2. Ernsr H Gombrich, Meditations on a Hobby Horse. London 1963; Nelson Coodman, Langlll/ge$ of
Art, Indiana 1985.
G3. See Kcmpers, 'De verleiding van het beeld', Tijdschrifi voorGeschiedenii (I 993) 45.
G4. As quoted in Haskell, Historyand itsImage" 492.
65. See Rolf Reichardr's contribution to this volume and Quenrin Skinner, 'Ambrogio Lorenzeni: The
Artist as Political Philosopher', Proceedings ofthe BritishAcademy(1986) 156.
fiG. Plato, Crarylm, 408. See Donald Kdly, Horizonso/Imeflectual History, 152.
NOTES 279
Index ofNames
Abddfcnah, A. 1\7, 262
Accursius 269
Agulhon, M. 272
Adam 158
Adams, J. 45
Adams, P. 250
Adhemar, J. 273
Aeneas 154
Alciaro, Andreas (also Alciati, Alciarus, Alciar] 7,
8,99, 100, 191,242,243,259
d'Alembert, J..B. 110,265
Alexander VI, pope 150
Alice-in-Wonderland, 13!
d'Allemagne, H.R. 274
Alpers, S. 168, 169, 173, 174, 183,235,236,
270,271,278
Arnbrosius 267
d'Amico, J. 268, 269
Ammirato, Scipione 73
Andries, L. 273
Angel, Ph. 175, 271
Ankersmit, F. 279
Anscombe, G.E.M. 249
Apelles 271
Apollo 15t!, 27\
Aquinas, Thomas 163,267,268
Archenholtz, j.W. van 119
Arcndr, H. 76,251,256
Aristotle 45,53,72,87,94,96,100,152,153,
158,160,161,163,229,256-258,266-269
Amdr, E.M. 121-128,263
Assmann, A. 117,262,263
Aubin, H. 244
Auger, Abbe Arhanase 275
Augustine lOG, 154, 158, IGO, 162, 267269
Augustus, emperor 159,267-269
Aulard, A. 273
Austin,].L 5,42,43,76,77,230,234,249,256
Baarsen, R, 278
Bacon, Francis 168, 163,235,236
Badius 268, 269
Baccque. A. de 105,260,272,273
Bailly, David 168, 169, 187,236
Baker, K, 48,251,272
Bakhrine, M. 94
Baldensperger, E 261
Baldini, E. 254
Baldus de Ubaldis 68
Ball, T. 6, 9, 228, 233, 239, 246, 249-251, 256,
257,260,277. 278
Barbier, F. 263
Barhe,B.116,119,262
Bamard, EM. 261
Bartas, Guillaume de Salosre 185
Bary, Henrick 184
Basset, A. 199, 201, 202, 205, 214-216, 222
Battaglini, M. 260
Battista de Luca, G. 73, 255
Baudoio,]. 191, 272
Baur, EC. 13
Baylc, Pierre 109
Beaumarchais, J.-P. 261
Bcckcr, J. 270
Bedaux,].-B.270
Bellori, G.P. 135,140,142-145,151,266,268
Benedictus, A. de 269
Berce, Y.-M. 274
Berding, H. 251, 276
Berger, P.L. 258
Bergerac, Cyrano de 107
Bergmann, G. 256
Bernardo del New 69
Bernstein, R. 276
Bialosrocki, J. 270
Binner, R. 257
Blaeu, W. 187
Blasse-Hegeman, H. 271
Bleibtreu; H. 254
Bloeh, M. 24
Blom, H. 254
Blum, A. 273
INDEX OF NAMES 281
Blunt, A.F. 265, 266
Blunrschli 34
Bobbio, N. 255
Bock, G. 242
Bodin, Jean 108,255
Boer, P. den 4, 234, 239, 243, 245, 246
Boes, A. 274
Bohler, O. 276
Bolkensrein, M. 264
Bollenbeck. G. 262
Bonavenrura. M. 153,264
Bonini, Filippo Maria 72,73,255
Bonger, H. 278
Borgia 145,150-152
Bonelli, G. 254
Botero, C;iovanni 6,67,70,71, 254
eo, H. 260
Boulab-Ayoub, J. 274
Boyd, M. 275
Boyer-Brun, J..M. 263
Bodeker, H. 5, 228, 231-233, 239, 246, 264, 277
Bramante 150
Branden, L. van den 245, 278
Braudel, F. 17,244
Brechr, B. 94,101
Bredero, G.A. 183
Brenner, CO. 274
Brellgd, Pierer 176, 183,271
Brisc, Cornclis 188, 189,272
BrockhallS 34
Broo>, B. 271, 272
Brunette Larini 68
Brunner, O. 1,14, IS, 17, 18,21,24,244,245,
251,252,256
Bubner, R. 258
Bude, G. 269
Buhr, M. 263
Buisson, L. 244
Bull,G. 140
Burekhardt,J.140,265
Burke, Edmund 40,240,248
Burke, P. 105, 259, 260
Busse, J. 252-254, 273
Cajetanus, seeVio
Campanelfa.Tommaso 72,255
Campe. J.H. 118
Canu, ].-O.-E. 217
Capel, L.M. 255
Capponi, Piero 69
Carnap, R. 97,259
282 INDEX OFNAMES
Carroll, L 264
Casa, Giovanni della 67, 69, 71
Cassirer, E. 247
Castellesi, A. 269
Castiglione, D. 246,247,250
Cararina, Santa 268
Catlin, G.E,G. 247
Cats, Jacob 235
Ceasar, [ulius 268
Cerreau. Michel de 262
Cervantes, M. de 75
Chambray, Frearr dc 135,140
Chansard, V. 272
Chapman, H. Perry 27 I
Charles V, emperor 67, 69
C:hartier, R. 111, 261
Chcmin-Duponres, J."8. 194,273
Chomsky, N. 97
Cicero 68,70,71,106,152-154,156,157,158,
161, 163, 164, 234, 235, 254, 267-269
Cimabuc, Giovanni 144
Clement VII, pope 144
Cloots, A. 111,112,261
Co<:hin, CN. 19J
Cock, H. 141
Cohen, D. 272
Colle, Ch. 275
Collier, Edwaerr 185, 186. 187
ColJingwood, R.G. 76,230,256
Coluccio Saluran 68
Comenius, J.A. 235
Comre, A. 23,140,265
Condorcet, M. marquis de 220
Connolly, W.E. 256
Conze, W. 1,14,16-18,24,243-245,251,256
Coornhcn, Oirck Volckensz 234, 235, 278
Cope, J.1. 257
Copemicus, Nicolaus 83
Corneille 123
Cortesi, Paolo 158,162-164,268
Cosenu. E. 245
Cosimo 1de Medici 107, 255
Cosre. D. 261
Court,]. 246
COUly, D. 261
Couzens Hoy, D. 276
Coxie. M. 141
Crcpy, L. 202
Cmee, B. 255
(mos, Anthonie 176. 177
Cujas, J. 108
Cumaean sibyl 154
Cybele, ancient goddess 145, 153
Dagger, R. 256
Dante Alighieri 153, 154, 161,267
Danto, A. 257
Danton, G.]. 126
Darncon. R 261, 265, 275
Dauphin 211, 214, 216
David, Jewish king 158
Delft, L. van 264
Della Casa, Giovanni ut! Casa
Oerrida,J.94,251
Descanes, R. 21, 100
Dcsprez, J..L. 27.'1
Diana Polymastcc, ancient goddess 145
Didcror, Dcnnis 265
Dierz, M.G. 256
Dijksrcrhuis, E.J. 265
Dik, S. 243
Dilrhey, W. 13,228,229,236
Dinzdbacher, P. 259
Diogencs 142, 212
Dionysius the Areopagite 161
Don Quixore 75
Dopsch, A. 17
Dunn,]. 248, 256, 257
Duponal,J.272
Dusart, C. 180
Dusausoir, E.J. 193
Dusslcr, L. 264
Egidia 269
Einem, H. von 140,264,266
Eisenstein, E.L 261
Elias, N. 104
Ellenius, A. 271
Ernrnensv j.A. 271
Ennius, Q. 161
Epicurus 153
Erasmus 106, 108, 109, 155, 231, 242, 260,
268,269,277
Erlieh, V.259
Ermarrh, M. 276
Euben, P. 256
Eucken, R. 24,245
Eve 158
Eyck, jan van 236, 237, 265
Fabri de Peiresc, Nicolas de 108
Fabricius. C. 263
Pamcse, Onavio duke 69
Farr, J. 233, 250, 251, 257-258, 277, 278
Febvre, L. 24
Pcdcnco da MOJllcfelrro 152
Fcmia, J. V. 84,85,257
Fernbach, D. 257
Ficlne, J. G. 119, 121, 125, 126, 263, 265
Ficino, Marsilio 160
Figurh, R. 258
Filmer, R. 247
Firpo, L. 255
Fish, S. 41, 248
Flew, A. 247
rolgcr, J. 38
Forslcr, G. 118, 241
Fou(ault, M. 61,258,274
Faugeret de Monrbron, Louis-Charles 110, 114,
261
Francois, E. 264
Franirs, W. 278
FrankJin, B. 261
FrankJin, J. 248
Ftcan, Roland 265,266
Freedberg, D. 235, 237, 270, 278, 279
Freeden, M. 246
Freud, S. 258
Pricke, H. 258
Frijhoff, W. 7, 239, 260-262
Froben 269
Frornmel, c.t. 266
Fuhrmann, M. 276
Gadamer, H"G. 90,91,229,232,245,253,258,
276,277
Gallic, W.B. 80,256
Cann, E. 254
Ceach, P. 249
Ceesr, Wybrand de 175, 270
Gelderblom, A.J. 276, 278
Oelderen, M. van 8, 240, 245, 246, 252, 276
Gerard, Michelre-Pere Cerard
Gerrirsz., Hessel 271
Gessingcr.}. 252, 253
Gewirth, A. 247
Ghisi,Giorgio 136,138,140142,144, \60, 165
Gierke, O. van 17
Gilbert, F. 254
Gib of Virerbo 154,163
Gilli, M.26\
Ciovanni della Casa, ,re Casa
Ctrard, A.R. 274
INDEX OF NAMES 283
Glendower, o. 43
Codicke 118
Goldie. M. 256
Coldman, A.1. 258
Colaio, V 135.264
Gombrich, E.H. 140,237,264,279
Goodin, R.E. 256
Goodman, N. 237,279
Gough.J.W. 247
Gowlli, B. 268
Crafron, A. 262
Gramsci. A. 84,85,257
Gravelor, H.E ] 91
Gregoire.H.116,119,120
Gregorovius 24
Gregory the Great 161
Gricder, J. 261
Grijzenhout, E 278
Grimani, D. 268
Croor, K.W. de 245
Groores, E.K. 270
Grossmann, M. 260
Gronus, Huge 40
Grubmuller, K. 259
Guicciardini, F. 67.69-72,254
Guiraudon, V 261
Cumbrechr, H.-U. 104,232,244,253,259
Gummere, R.M. 254
Gutman 266, 267
Habermas,]. 19,80.85,257
Hacker, A. 247
Hadas-Lebel, M. 275
Hagstrum, j.H. 270, 271
Hairsrna Mullier, E. 243, 245
Hals, Frans 271
Hampsher-Monk, I. 5, 6, 228, 231, 232, 240,
246,250-252.278
Hanna.LE 257
Hanson, R.L 250, 251, 256, 277
Hardener, L 219
Harrington,). 41,247
Haskell, F. 265, 279
Hazard, 1'. 261
Hehrard,]. 261,273
Hechr, P. 270, 271
Heem.Tan Davidsz dc 173, 183, 184
Heesakkers, Chr. 264
Hegel. G.w.F. i. 24, 76
Heidegger, M. 229, 230
Heilbron, J. 264, 265
284 INDEX OFNAMES
Heijden, Jan van der 187
Heinzmann,J.G.118
Hengst, D. den 264
Hcnri IV 199, 200, 202, 203, 208, 212, 214.
221,224,274,275
d'Herbois, Collot 193, 203
Herder,F. 23,111,261
Herding, K. 241, 273, 274
Hermann, F. 274
Homes Trismegistus 160, 161
Herodorus 232, 277
Hertz, H. 76
G. van den 106, 107, 110,260,261
Hinrze, O. 17
Hilger, D. 253
Hitler, A. 26
Th. 39-41,43.240,247,248,256
Homer 161
Honig, B. 251
Honthorst, Gerard van 183
Hoogervorst, j.R.H. 278
Horaee, 161, 175,271
Horsrmann, R.P. 258
Hotman, Fr. 108
Horspur, H. 43
Hould, C. 261
Howard, R.j. 276
Hofer, A. 252
Huizinga. J. 22.235-238,245,265,278,279
HumbolJt, A. von 121
Humpty Dumpry 131
Hunt, L 48,144,259,272
Huntinton, J.F. 256
lnghiramiv Tomrnaso 158,163,164
!pscn, G. 17,24
Jacob 174
Jacobani, Domenico 164
jahn, L 121,122,124-126
Janinet, F. 275
jaritz, G. 261
Jams, H.R. 276
Jager, H.W. 261
Jefftr.\on, T. 45
[eromc 160,162
jeune, Nyon le 274
John the Evangelise 158, 160, 163
Joly, C 26.'3
Jone5, H.W. 257
Jongh, E. de 8, 228, 235, 236, 269272, 278
joscph 174,270
josephus, Flavius 185
jouvenei. B. de 79,256
Judas Iscarione 195, 197
julia, D. 262
julius n, pope \31, 135, 140, 142, 145,
150-152,158-160,162-164,266-269
juratic, S. 263
justinian 153
jutrc, R. 259
Kaiser, G. 264
Kaminsky, H. 245
Kamlah, W. 252, 258
Kam, L 50,258
Kapl-Blurne, E. 246
Kaplan, S.L. 276
Karwan Cutting, 01.E. 272
Kamrzky, MA 274
Kelley, D. 229, 276
Kellner, H. 279
Kcrnpers, B. 7, 8, 228, 240, 268, 279
Kierkegaard. S. 75,76,256
Klooger 21'J
Kloek, W. 278
Klopslock, EG. 119
Knobloch, C. 2'53
Kobergcr 269
Kocka, J. 252
Koerner-Boume, S. 272
Kohlsrhmidr, W. 259
Koscllcck, R. I, 2, 4-6, 14-23, 40, 47, 48, 51-64,
77, 78, 88-90, 97, 103, 105, 228-232, 241,
243-245,247,250-254,257-259,276,277
Kossmann, E.H. 278
KOlzebue, A von 127,264
Komer,Th. 121,124,126,257
Kraus, H. 264
Kraus, K. 76
Krisrallcr. P.O. 26'5, 266, 268
Krul, W.E. 278
Kruger, P. 254
Kuhn, Th.S. J22, 140,2'58,265
LaWStC, Fr. 118, 262
Lactamius 160,161,269
Lairesse, Gerard de 170, 270
Lamprccht, K. 24
Lankhorst, O. 260
i.asletr, P. 247, 248, 250, 2'57
Latude217,221
Lausrer, M. 262
Law,John 209
Lawson, G. 248
Lee, R.W. 271
Leers, R. 260
Lefevre d'Eraples, J. 269
Leffson, A. 263
Lehmann, H. 250, 251, 254
Lcith,JA 274
Leo X, pope 266
l.cpellerier de Saint-Pargcau 119
Leguinio,J.M. 193
Leslic, M. 84,85,257
Lees, Cicvanni 73,255
Levi, M.-F. 273
Leyster, judirb 235
Linnaeus, M. 95
Locke, John 40,44,82,247
Lockyer, A 248
Lombardus, Petrus 162-163
Longman, EW. 271
Lcrenzen, P. 252, 258
Lorenzeni, Amhrogio 279
Louis XIV 209, 261
Louis XVI 204, 210, 214, 216, 220, 221,275
Lovejoy, AO. 39, 40, 230
Luca, Giovan Banisra de, sa Bauisra de Luca
Luckmann, Th. cr. 257, 258
Lucretius 153,157, IGI, 2G6
Ludz, n.c. 251
Luijlen, G. 240, 271, 278
Luke the Evangelist 160
Uisehrink, H.-J. 7, 241, 262-264, 273-276
Lyons, J. 258
Machiavclli 43, 44, 70-72, 82, 85, 242, 247,
249, 254, 255
Maclnryre. A. 76,83,256,257
Macrct, c.r 212
Madison, G. 45
Malagrida, G. 273
O'Malley, J. 271
Malveni, VirgiJio 73
Mander, Karel van 141, 170
Marc the Evangelist 144,160
Marcello, Crisroforo 158,163,164
Marijnissen, R.H. 271
Marsilius of Padua 247
MaLlya" opponClll of Apollo 158
Marx, KarJ 23,53,77,81,8'5,86,240,257
Mason, R.A. 246
INDEX OF NAMES 285
Mathiez, A. 261
Mattei, R. de 254, 255
Matthew the Evangelist 160,163
Mazochi 269
Meadow, M. 271
Medici 69,71,107,152
Meier, H.G. 245
Meijer, P.W.M. de 279
Meineckc, Ft. 14, 16, 17
Meldon, A.1. 249
Mcrcicr, L.-S. 119, 125, 126,263
Merian, Maria S. 235
Merker, P. 259
Merkl, PH. 247
Mersenne, M. 108
Meulen, M. van der 271
Michelangelo 131,141, 144, 185
Milanesi, G. 135,265
Miller, P:N. 246
Milne, AA 95
Milton, John 81
Mirabeau, Comte de 209, 210, 214, 215,220,
275
Moes,J.261
Mohr, W. 259
Mommsen, Th. 254
Monnier, R. 276
Montaigne 101,106
Monresquieu, Ch.-L. de Sccondac 8, 45, 125,
209,213,215,220,220
Moormann, E. 264
Moreau le jeune, Jean Michel 211-213
Morelly, J.B. 125
Morgenrhau. H.]. 247
Morris, C. 247
MOUl, M.E.H.N. 278
Mcser, J. 24,261
Muller, G. 243
Muses 145,153,154,156,158
Muller, J.-O. 259
Myrens, David 181-183, 185
Nagonius, J.M. 268
Napoleon Bonaparte 262
Narbonne 119
Neber-Bemheim, R 276
NicholasV, pope 150
Nies, F. 264
Nua 255
Nuysement. J. de 261
286 INDEX OF NAMES
Oakeshon, M. 87,257
Oerlemans, J.W. 111,261
Oksenberg, A. 257
Oliel-Crausz, E. 276
Ovid 161
Ozuuf, M. 261
Pagdcn, A. 248, 250
Pannenbcrg, W. 276
Paul the Evangelist 141, 142, 158, 160-162, 164,
268, 269
Pauw-de veen, L. de 272
Parmenio, 266
Peck, L.L. 246
PeirescseeFabri de Peiresc
Pelikan,]. 256
PercGerard 199, 200, 203, 207, 224, 275
Pers, 0.1'. 270
Peter the Evangelist 145, 161
Perrarch 161, 267
Perrir, Ph, 256
Pfeiffer, H. 140,264,266-269
Philip 11 of Spain 228
Pieo della Mirandola 160
Pierorti, P: 260
Plamenatz, J. 247
Pinruricchio 151
Plato 39,154, 157, 160, 161, 163,238,247,
267-269,279
Plutarch 175
Pocock, ].G.A. 2,5,6,37-42,46,47,49,230,
231,243,246-250,256,257,276-278
1'01, L.R. 271
Polenz, P. von 252
Poliziano 160
Pollaiuolo 151
Polyhymnia, the Muse 145
Pomeau, R. 261
Popper, K. 96,247,259
Porreman, K. 271
Porter, R. 105,260
Posrel, Guillaume 106-108
Poussin, N. 143
Ptault, L.-L. 275
Price, R. 249
Prolemy 142
Publius 250
Pynas, Jan 174
Pythagoras 144, 160
Quatremhe de Quincy, Antoine 192
Querel, C. 274
Quevedo y ViJlegas, F. de 270
Rabaur Saint Ericnnc 211, 274
Racine 123
Rackham, H. 254
Raimondi,265
Raphael 7,8,131-136,138,140-149,151, 152,
154,155,157"165,264-269
Ravaillac. J.-F. 208
Ravensreijn, N. van 245
Rayner, j. 250, 259
Reichardt, K.F. 118
Reichardr, R. 1, 8,18-20,40,53,56,57,59,62,
103,104,228,232,233,238,241,244,252,
253,256,259,262,273"279
Reiehel, E. 264
Reinhard, M. 117,274,275
Reisch, G. 268
Rembrandt van Rijn 173, 178, 183, 236, 237,
240,270-272
Renard de Saine-Andre, Simon 186,272
Reveilliere-Lepeaux. LM. 120, 121,262
Revel, J. 262
Rey, A. 261
Reynolds,j. 175,271
Richrer, I.A. 271
Richter, M. 1,47,243,246-254,259,276,277
Ricoeut, P. 89,258
Ridder-Symocns, H. de 260
Ridderus, Pranciscus 168, 184
Rijser, D. 264
Rnnmon-Kenan, S. 258
Ripa, Ccsare 170, 181, 182, 185, 186, 191, 270-
272
Rirrer, J. 243
Robertson, J.c:. 246
Robespierre, Max. 119,262,263
Robin, R. 245
Roche. D. 275
Roederer, J.-L. 120
Ruger, B. 260
Roonprsy. C.E.D. 261
Roor-Bernsrein, M. 275
Rorty, R. 256
Rothacker, E. 13,22,24,90,236,243,258
Rorhfels, H. 17,244
ROllsseau, J.-J. 23, 39, 44, 110, Ill, 125, 205,
209,211,212,214,215,225,242,247,261
Roux, M. 274
Rongers, K. 254
Runciman, W.G. 248
Russcll, B. 247
Ruyseh, Rachel 235
Rucgg, W. 260, 261
Ruthcrs, B. 243
Sabine, G.H. 247
Sallusr 234
Saluwi, C. 254
Salviati, Prancesco 144
Sanci, Giovanni 152
Sappho 161
Sas. N. van 243, 245, 269
Saussure, Perdinand de 2, 30, 40, 231
Savage, D. 258
Savonarola, G. 254
Scaliger, joseph JUStUS 108
Scarano, E.L. 254
Schama, S, 235, 276, 278
Schenkeveld, MA 270
Schieder, W. 245, 259
Schleich, Th. 104,259
Schleiermachcr, F. 228, 229
Schlererh, Th.]. 261
Schlcsinger, W. 24
Schlieben-Lange, B. 252, 253
Schluter, LLE. 268
Schmidt, W. 254
Schmin, C. 243
Schmin,E. 1,14,15,21,24,103,252,256
Schneemann, P.). 272
Schneider, H. 275
Schochcr, 246
Seholz, B. 6, 241
Schoffer, I. 278
Schortler, P. 254
Schubart 119,262
Schuffenhauer, H. 263
Schulze, H.-K. 253
Schulze, S. 270
Schulze, W. 244
Schurz, A. 257
Schwab, D. 246
Schwartz, G. 271
Schwoerer, L.G. 246
Schwur, Robcrr 124
Starle, ).R. 5,42,249
SelIin, V. 245, 253, 259
Sendivogius, M. 260
Scncca 161,234,254,268
l:--JDEXOFNAMFS 287
Senn, H. 262
Shakespeare 43,249
Shearman, J. 140,264,266
Shils, E. 256
Sieyes, E.]. 119,241
Simonet. ]ean-Bapti,te 213
Simmel, G. 236
Sinus IV, pope 150, 151
Skinner, Q. 2, 5, 6, 37-39, 42-47, 49, 84-86,
230,231,233,238,242-243,246-250,256-
257,276-279
Slawinski.]. 94,258
Slits, E 264
Slive, S. 271
Sluijrer. E.-].270, 278
Snedage, D.L 118,262
Soboul, A. 261
Socrates 80,85, 26B
Sodcrini, Paolantonio 69,254
Solomon 157
Spema Weiland,]. 263
Spies, M. 271
Sprat, T 257
Stammler, W. 259
Srarkse. A. 260
Statim 161
Steen.Tan 173, 174, 179, 183,269,271
Sreffens. W. 263
Sregmulfer. W. 259
Steiner, Heinrich 100
Stevin, Simon 21,245
Stinger, Ch.S. 268
StolJeis, M, 254
Strauss. L. 247
Srrauss, W. 271
Stuivcling, G. 270
Suchrcl<:n, A. van 278
Sully 203
Suratlcau, J.R. 261
Tacirus 122
Talmon,].L. 247
Tatian 160
Taylor. Ch. 250
Tcnenri, A. 254
Tenullian 106,160,267
Teubert, W. 274
Texte,].264
Thcophilus 161
Thomas. Saint 255
Thins, jean-Bapriste 112
288 INDEX or NAMES
Thucydides 232, 256
Tiberius, emperor 71
Tien-Lin, Chang 264
Tillon, Ch. 275
Tilmans, K. 242
Toews, J. 276
ToJJebeek, J. 278
Tomassi, T. 255
Traini, F. 268
Tribe, K. 47,247,250,256
Trier, J. 24
Trochsch, E. 117,262
Tr01l550n, R 261
Tuck, R. 248
Tully,]. 246-249, 257, 277
Ulpian 68,153
Urrnso, la. 249
Vacnius, Orro 171, 172, 270
Van Eyck, seeEyck
Van Horn Mclton, ].244,245
Varennc, Ch. 275
Varro 154,161
Vasari, G. nI, 135, 140-145, 150, IS\, 160,
165,264-266
veen, H. van 278
ven-Brause, l. 245
Veldman. I.M. 278
Velerna, W. 239, 243, 245
Vcncziano 144,160,165
Venne, Adriaen van de 180
Venus 153
Vcrmccr, johenncs 171-173, 236, 237, 270
VCSlier, Anroine 217
Vetruvius 242
Vice, Giarnbanista 23
Vigerio. Paolo ]58,163,164,268
Vinci, Leonardo da 141, 175,242,271
Vinckboons, David 176, 177,271
Vio, Tommaso de, alias Cajeranus 158, 163, 164
Virgil 153,154,158,161,268
Viroli, M. 6, 242, 254
Visscacr, Claes (?) janszoon 176, 177
v--m. Paolc 70
Viterbo, Egidio da 154, 158, 163, 164, 269
Vieruvius 140
Vocr, L. 260
Volraire 110,119,123,202,209,214,215,220,
225,261,275
Vondel, van den 170, 174-176, 188, 189,
235,270-272
Von Einem, H. see Einem 140
Vovelle, M. 19,272,276
Vuillemin-Diem. G. 267
Vree, F. van 242, 279
Vries,]. de 270, 271, 278
Vries, 1. de 270, 271
Waddy, P. 266
Wagnn, M. 272
Waller, E. 249
Waguet, F. 260
Wark, R.R. 271
A. 254
Weber, M. 32
Weber, W. 244, 245
Weimann, R. 259
Weimar, K. 259
Weisc:hedel, W. 258
WeJden, T.O, 247
Wes,eJing, A. 260
Wes,em, J. van 269
Weslerbaen, )acob 183
Whire, C.W. 274
While, H. 246
White, J.B. 256
Wiehl, R. 91,258
WieJand, C.M. 263
Wi!liams, R, 250
Winch, P. 256
Winner, M. 140,26(,
Winnie-lhe-Pooh 95
Winter, P.]. van 276
Wirsrdn, S.F. 270
Wille, E. 269
Wittgenstein, 1. 5,59,76,230,231,233,234,
256, 274
WokJer, R. 247
Woltjer, J.J. 278
WoJheneJ, F. 262
WoJin, S. 248
Wood,],140,264-266
Woude, A. van der 278
Wuestman, G. 271
Zammiro, J.H. 276
Zenobios, 10(,
Zilsel, E. 265
Zimmermann,]. 259
Zoroaster 142
Zuccolo, Ludovico 72,255
INDEX 01' NAMES 289
Index ofSubjects
Absolutism 84, 194
agency 5,49,50,83,91, 92,104,231
allegory 18]
Ancient Constitution 42, 228
ancients and modems 140-141
Annales SchocilZ, 24, 104
archirecrure, as cultural space 140,I4l
aristocracy 45,112,116,215,221,223-225
aristocrat as traitor 195, 196, 197, 198, 213, 224,
225
arithmetic 152,157,164
anes liberales 135,151,152,157
astrology 143-145
Begn/figeschichte J-8, 13, 2226, 28, 30, 31,
33-35, 37, 38, 47-49, 51-63. 75, 77, 78,
89-91,96-101,105,115,228,229,230-233,
223, 238
broadsheet 194, 196
citizemry) 198, 216
classicism 140
commonwealth 71,227
constitution I, 24, 27, 42, 45, 48, 49, 57, 58, 61,
77, 115, 120, 121,204,208,210,211,219,
223, 228
convention 43, 46, 92
cosmopolitanism 125
7, 106, 107, 110, 111
court 20, 109, 140, 143, 152, 153, 158, 160,
164
crisis 16
cultural history 7,20, 89, 103-105, 114, 135,
237
cultural tramfer see transfer
culture 3, 8, 14, 20, 23, 76, 80, 104, 105,
108-110,112,113,116,117,121,123-126,
142, 143, 151, 157, 168, 173, 174, 227,
235-237
diachrony 2,4, 5, 30-32, 34, 35, 39, 40, 42, 46,
48,49,51,53,62,230
dictionary 8, 13, 20, 52, 88, 117, 1[8,233
discourse 1-3,5,7,46,48,49,51,53,61,62,
64,75, 77-83, 91, 98, 100, 101, 116, 117,
120,122-128,140,173,229,231,232
emblem 6-8,98-100, 140, 142, 172, 176, 186,
235
empiricism 235
Enlightenment 1, 18, 20, 21, 23, 33,104,110,
112,117,121, 126, 221
equality 45,55,82,106,189,192
ethnicity 82, 122-124
fatherland 22, 106-108, 110, 11], 114, 118,
124,210,214,215
feudal society 20, 42, 116
foreign 70,108,109,112,116,117,121-125,
164
form and content 167,170
French Revolution 7, 38, 48, 61, 111-113, 116,
117,119,124-127,191-225
French Republic 192
game 8,175,191-225,234
genre 5,7,8,29,44,46,47,77. 93, 95, 100,
127,169,170,175,179,235
geometry 145,152,157
Golden Age 143,235,238
grammar 40,46, 125, 152, 158, 162-164
harmony 157,158,160,163,164,175,234,236
herrnencurics 9,14,24,89,90,155,228-230,
237,238
Hemchaft 1-2
historicism 16,39,52,90,228
hiHoriography 2,13,17,20,38,47,52,61,83,
91,95,104,140,230
history 1-9,13-21, 23-35, 37-40, 42-44, 46-55,
57-64, 67, 73, 75-78, 81-84, 86101,
103-106,109,110,113115, 117, 131, 135,
140,141,144,152,154,155,164,170,175,
185,189,227-238
INDEXOfSUBJECTS 291
horizon, cultural 90,99,229,230
humanism 7,40,112,140,160
hypostatization 121
iconography 8,135, 141, 142, 171, 183,223,
224,225
iconology 142,168,169,186,227,235
innovation 17,35,44,45,76,85, 152,228,230
intention 41, 43, 44, 82, 142, 154, 168, 170-172
intcnextualiry 230,233
jeux de I'oie 199, 20I
jurisprudence 24,73,131,135,151-153,155
justice 28,30,63,67-70,72,82,131,145,153,
156,158,227,228
key concepts 2,8,82,85
kcy words 20, 55
law 1,6,8,13,14,33,34,40,42,45,68,71-73,
79,88,98, 120, 153, 156, 176
liberty 2,70,82,110,191,192,213-217,220,
222-227,228,234
library 7,37,38,108,150,151,152,164
life world 87,90,92
linguistic purity 122
linguistic rum 6,22,75-77,104,228,229
linguistics 2,5,24,51-53,97,105,232
literacy 115,183
literary criticism 6,96
love 26,27,34,75,118,122,171,172,229,232
meaning 1,2,4,5, 13, 15, 16, 18,21,28,30,31,
35, 39, 40, 42-47, 49, 51, 53-59, 61-63,
67-69,71,73,76,77, 80, 82, 85, 86, 89, 97,
103-105,107, Ill, 113-116, 118, 120, 121,
123,124,126,131,140,144,145,151-153,
155-157,160,162,165,167-173,175,184,
230,231,233-235
medallion 145,152,184
medieval society 3, 17, 18,24, 143, 145, 154,
161,228,236,237
mimcus: art as 237
modernity 2, 38, 40
morality 34,56,69-73,75,76,79-81, 83, 107,
119,152,153,172, 173, 175, 184,235
moral philosophy 152
music 120,152,157
narrative 25,29,90,91, 104, 115, 127, 154
292 HISTORY OF CONCEPTS
nation 7, 107, 109, 110, 112, 115-121, 124-128,
235
national game 215
national identity 3, 117, 123, 125, 126
National Socialism 19
national spirit 117,125,126
nationalism 7,109,117,119-122,124-127
normative, character of language 33,34,59,85,
86,231,234
onomasiology 2,6,92,95,97
ontology 60,228
ordinary language philosophy 76
papacy 158,160,164,165
patriotism 214-216
personification 145, 154, 156, 157
philology 2,82,232
Philosophie 20, 209
picrorialism 174,175
pOetry 8,18,97,131,135,145,151,152,163,
164,170,174,175,182,188,235
politics 1, 3, 6, 14,21, 24, 37, 40, 42, 48, 52, 53,
67-73, 88, 105, Ill, 122, 131, 164, 165,
230-232
positivism 7, 104
prints 135,144,160,237
popular prints 205
prosperity 227,228
proverbs 8,168,175,176,183,187
quadrivium 152
race 33, 120, 125
ragion di uato see reason of state
reality 1, 5, 7, 14,32,34,35,48,49, 54, 55,
58-63,75,89,90,97, 103-105, 108-114,
151,228-230,232,237
reason of stale 6,67-73
Renaissance 8, 21, 72, 81, 106, 109, 113, 119,
125,131, 140, 143, 145, 175
representation 3, 8, 23, 25, 28, 82, 92, 103,
110-114, 141, 142, 170, 173,227,228,233,
234,237
republicanism 37, 41, 69, 70, 8I, 82, 116, 118,
120,126,193,204
revolution 7, 14-18,38,39,48, 6\, 73, 77, 82,
83,111-113,116-119,124-127,140
rhetoric 46, 12l, 127, 152, 163, 174, 175
righrsof man 8, 78, 214-215, 221-225
Satte/zeit 2-4, 14, 15, 18, 19,21, 22, 90, 91, 93,
113
semantic field 2,7,8,56,106,109,111,114,
117, \Hl, 128,225,234
semantics 5,21,34,35,47,54,55,59,60,61,
62,63,64,91,103,105,107,111-115, \20,
122,123,124,126,127,152,170,220223,
232,233
semasiology 2,6,52,58,92,95,97,232
socia] history 4,5,7,14,16,17,2328,3032,
34,35,47,49,51,52,54,59,61-63,89,91,
103-106, 109, 110, 113, 114, 117,229,230,
212
sources 1s, 19, 21, 24, 28, 29, 3133, 38, 53, 59,
103,131,144,152,155,228,233,234,237
specch Kt 4-6,42-46,62,105,231,234
stained glasswindows 227
Stanza de/la Vatican 7, 131, 135, 140,
143145,150,151,155,157,165
,tratification 16, 110, 113, I 14
studia Immanitati> 152
symbol 63,94, 163
synchrony 2,4,5,30,31,32,34,35,39,40,42,
46, 48, 51, 62
text and image 7-9, see also words and imagcs
theology 14,20,26,33,108, \31, 140, 143145,
151-154,156,158,160,162-164
toleration 84,106,110,209,215,225
transfer, cultural 4, 7, 47, 52, I 10, 115-117, 121,
125128
Irivium 152
urbanisation 20
nanitas 168,178,185,188,235
Volk 118,121, l2S
words and images 7,8,100,135,151, 152, 155,
157,170,234-238
INDEX OF SUBJECTS 293